TPPF + ALEC

The Texas Public Policy Foundation pretends that it is an independent nonprofit. But with Tea Party partners and prominent Washington D.C. think tanks, like ALEC, TPPF is protecting corporate profits at taxpayers expense. Report by Progress Texas November 2013

Executive Summary

In-depth analysis of the Texas Public Policy Foundations most recent legislative agenda shows that TPPF supported legislation that mirrored at least 28 different ALEC bill templates pre-voted on by corporate lobbyists on ALEC task forces during the 2013 regular session of the Texas Legislature. Whether writing policy papers or testifying in committee, TPPF rarely if ever acknowledges the ALEC positions, talking points, or money that has undoubtedly shaped its conclusions. The money trail connecting TPPF to ALEC as well as dozens of other cookie-cutter think tanks across the country remains vast, extensive, and unknown by many in Texas. A close examination of their work makes one thing clear: the Texas Public Policy Foundation cannot be trusted as the independent voice it claims to be in Texas policymaking. TPPF pretends that it is an independent nonprofit. That may be technically true, but a thorough examination of their work reveals it is not independent at all rather, it has ceded its decision making to national Tea Party partners, special interests, and out-of-state donors like those connected with ALEC. The following report offers a case study of TPPFs position on growth in the state budget and makes it clear that TPPF will say and do anything to protect the corporate interests of those who fund it and its allies.

Overview: TPPF + ALEC

The Texas Public Policy Foundations 2013-2014 legislative agenda championed at least 28 different ALEC model bills. As ALECs homeaway-from-home in the Lone Star State, TPPF ensures that think tanks and corporate lobbyists from Washington D.C. have a strong hand in Texas laws changed to that increase corporate profits at Texans expense. For example, on May 10, 2013, the Texas Public Policy Foundation delivered a letter to Texas Governor Rick Perry about the budget. They demanded that Perry do all he could to limit spending growth in the states two-year budget to population plus inflation growth. They also didnt want any money spent from the states savings account, better 1 known as the Rainy Day Fund. The letter warned that Texas must avoid becoming like California at all costs. The missive was signed by 14 Tea Party-connected groups, including several prominent conservative organizations based out of Washington D.C. At the center of the letterhead, with its logo prominently displayed at the top, was the American Legislative Exchange Council, better known as ALEC. The letter championed two ALEC bills the Tax and Expenditure Limitation Act and the Super Majority Act that reflect a core assumption of so-called conservative ideology: if state spending is suppressed, lawmakers will keep taxes low for businesses, thus insulating profits for corporations and keeping them away from building public institutions and promoting public good.

May 10, 2013 letter masthead displaying logos from ALEC, other Tea Party groups

The letter carried a lot of weight considering that many staffers at TPPF have worked for Perrys office or his campaigns, or both over the years. Additionally, TPPFs senior staff includes former GOP officials who worked 2 with Perry at the Capitol. TPPF and ALEC frequently echo Tea Party talking points and vice versa, lifting up free market rhetoric and an intractable allegiance to tax cuts over investments in the publics infrastructure education, health care, water and transportation even in states like Texas that could desparately use an influx of revenue to better secure a strong economy for the future. There is little original work from the Texas Public Policy Foundation, except for its unique capacity to get the ear of lawmakers with its distortions.

During a recent luncheon hosted at the Texas Capitol, TPPF proudly proclaimed that a donor purchased enough copies of TPPFs recent book to ensure every Republican official in the Texas Legislature had a copy. The same lunch was sponsored by3 AT&T, the top lobby client in the recently 4 completed legislative session and a major, long-time contributor to ALEC.

TPPF is also a member of the State Policy Network (SPN), a national web of 5 what right-wing talking head Michelle Malkin called do thanks that have been funded across the nation for a total of nearly $80 million a year 6 cumulatively, according to the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD). Like TPPF, SPN is a long time sponsor and member of ALEC. Several SPN staff members sit on ALEC task forces, proposing, voting on, and promoting ALEC bills. SPN, which echoes ALECs agenda in the states, is one of ALECs largest financial sponsors, as a Chairman level sponsor of ALECs 2011 and 7 20138 annual conference, which equated to at least a $50,000 contribution each 9 year , according to CMD, which publishes ALECexposed.org.

Texas Public Policy Foundation: ALECs Home Away From Home

For forty years, ALEC has served as a national consortium for corporate lobbyists and conservative lawmakers. The 501(c)3 nonprofit organization claims to have more than 2,000 dues-paying legislators along with hundreds of 10 corporations as members. ALECs primary purpose is to ensure corporate model bills are shipped across the country with conservative state lawmakers eager to please lobbyists that can thanks to ALECs nonprofit status wineand-dine legislators without concern of violating any state ethics and gift laws. With the help of TPPF, ALEC, and the corporate donors that help keep the two 501(c)3 nonprofits afloat, businesses from across the country and foreign corporations can rest assured their cookie-cutter model laws are pushed. TPPF and ALEC have worked closely together for well over ten years making TPPF a home-away-from-home for ALEC right here in Texas. As Progress Texas previously documented in ALEC Exposed in Texas:
11

Through its policy work and its fundraising efforts, ALEC and TPPF are closely linked and regularly work hand-in-hand to promote the profits of global corporations over creating better lives for Texans In the past, TPPF staff has submitted policy papers to be reproduced in the Inside ALEC publications, they have spoken at ALEC functions and events, and senior TPPF staff also sits on ALECs task forces. TPPF has even taken the lead in crafting legislation that it then sends off to ALECTPPF will regularly cite ALEC model legislation and resolutions in their policy papers and testimony.

In March 2012, ALEC came under attack for pushing the Stand Your Ground law across the country. On February 26, 2012, a Florida man, George Zimmerman, had shot an unarmed 17-year old African-American highschooler named Trayvon Martin, but Zimmerman had not been arrested based on that law, which ALEC had ratified as a national model after it passed in Florida in 2005. The closed-door meeting where corporate lobbyists secretly voted with legislators to push that legislation happened in Grapevine, Texas, in August 2005. Since then ALEC had pushed for that bill to become law in numerous states, including Texas. After the Trayvon Martin shooting, national and state groups, including Progress Texas, pressured businesses and lawmakers 12 to leave ALEC. In crisis control mode, ALEC was aided by an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal from the Texas Public Policy Foundation who was happy 13 to rush to ALECs defense. Zimmerman was ultimately tried for the killing but was not convicted after the jury was instructed that he had a right to stand his ground and no duty to retreat, under that new law. At ALECs recent Spring Task Force Summit in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma during the first week of May 2013, lawmakers and lobbyists did more than wine and dine. Behind closed doors and with armed security guards protecting their meeting rooms, lawmakers and lobbyists including staffers from the Texas Public Policy Foundation discussed bills to change state laws on education, energy, health care and tax reform.

Within a week of the ALEC meeting, those TPPF staffers were in Texas, urging Perry to support two major ALEC model bills with ALECs logo on their letterhead: - The Tax and Expenditure Limitation Act which would limit state 14 spending growth to population plus inflation ; and - The Super-Majority Act which would require a two-thirds, instead 15 of majority, threshold for passing tax incrases.

Case Study on Budget Numbers: TPPF Makes Up Fuzzy Math

TPPF didnt just sign the letter it put its muscle into making it binding law. Complete with a16brand new 501(c)(4) Texas Public Policy Action TPPF joined with Tea Party groups from Texas and across the country, including Grover Norquists Americans for Tax Reform and Michael Quinn Sullivans Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, to push these ALEC policies. When it was all over, TPPF lost, but only temporarily. Lawmakers passed a bill, celebrated by Governor Perry, allowing voters to authorize drawing down $2 billion in Rainy Day Fund money to pay for desparately needed water infrastructure 17 improvements in drought-ridden Texas. This went against the TPPF + ALEC call to leave the Rainy Day Fund untapped. However, it appears theey won a

commitment to keep growth in the state budget below the population plus 18 inflation growth factor, as they had sought. As the Associated Press reported :
Gov. Rick Perry and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst have promised to limit government spending to Texas population growth plus inflation, which is forecast to be 8 percent in 2014-15. As long as they stay under $95.58 billion, they will claim to have passed a conservative budget.

For 2013-2014, general revenue spending came in at $94.61 billion below ALECs coveted population + inflation growth limitation. But then something happened that no one expected: TPPF lashed out against Governor Perry and Texas lawmakers, and created what Texas Senate Finance Chairman Tommy Williams a chief budget writer in the Legislature and 20 among the staunchest conservatives in the state called fuzzy math. Unhappy with lawmakers decision to undo numerous accounting tricks utilized in the previous budget cycle, TPPF created a series of convoluted numbers that concluded that rather than limiting state spending to population21 plus inflation growth, Texas spent $22 billion more in the budget. GOP officials accused TPPF of convincing the Wall Street Journal (whose editorial 22 board has close ties to ALEC ) to write an editorial that harkened back to that 23 May 10 letter signed by ALEC and used their research. In response, Governor 24 Perry for the first time in recent memory shot back at TPPF, saying:
I did read some of the criticism, and Im not sure that those who were making that criticism have a really good handle on the Texas budgeting process. Frankly I dont understand their math.

19

Undaunted, TPPF kept the pressure on Perry but not before they emphasized that their political power was far more important than whose math was right. 25 In a statement on their website, TPPF wrote (emphasis added):
We can agree to disagree about exactly how much the 2014-15 budget grew and what methodology should be used to measure that growth; but what we cannot not do is ignore the fact that groups all across the nationall of whom have a vested interest in the success of conservatismwatched as the Texas budget process unfolded and were alarmed enough by all the new spending to take action.

The Texas Public Policy Foundation 26 a 501(c)(3) with a mission statement touting academically sound research didnt care about the math. By making it clear that cherryWhy is a nonpartisan picking numbers and distorting the nonprofit charity threatening truth didnt matter, TPPF was telling Perry and conservative Republican lawmakers with lawmakers that their political power primary vote numbers? is what mattered most. Perhaps thats why TPPF, in chastising Perry for the alleged massive increase in state spending, cited the viewpoints 27 of Republican primary voters instead of focusing on sound research:
Governor Perry, Texans want less government growth, not more. For instance, 94 percent of Texas voters in the 2012 Republican Primary supported the ballot proposition that called for limiting any increase in government spending.

Why would TPPF make up budget numbers to drive a wedge between Governor Perry and the Texas Legislature? Why is a nonpartisan nonprofit charity threatening Republican lawmakers with primary vote numbers? One reason could be loyalty to ALEC. After all, opposing using the states rainy day fund and limiting spending is not unique to TPPF. Other State 28 Policy Network think tanks in Ohio (the Buckeye Institute ) and Arizona (the 29 Goldwater Institute ) have also pressed legislators to the same conclusions as TPPF pushed in Texas. The case study in Texas most recent budget fight also highlights tensions between elected officials obligations to protect the public interest, and the TPPFs unyielding push to protect corporate profits. Admitting Texas could increase investments in public infrastructure while maintaining low levels of spending is too big a risk for ALEC corporations. Meanwhile as the 2014 elections begin, the ALEC agenda has taken first priority for Texas Republican gubernatorial nominee, Greg Abbott. In fact, 30 Abbotts first major policy proposal is exactly what TPPF and ALEC pushed 31 in 2013. From the opening of an October 28, 2013 Texas Tribune report :
In his first major policy address as a gubernatorial candidate, Attorney General Greg Abbott proposed tighter constitutional limits on state spending and increased constraints on the multibillion-dollar Rainy Day Fund.

TPPF & ALECs Agenda

Guide to the Issues 2013-2014.32

An examination of the full TPPF legislative agenda for 2013-2014 shows that TPPF backed a number of bills that echo the ALEC agenda. In the 2013 legislative session, TPPF advocated for at least 28 different laws that mirrored ALEC model bills, according to an extensive review of TPPFs published agenda for the legislative session, Keeping Texas Competitive: A Legislators Working with the Center for Media and Democracy, Progress Texas carefully analyzed the agenda of TPPF. It was discovered that on many issues education, taxes, pensions, health care, the environment, state vs. federal powers, and insurance TPPF + ALEC are almost one and the same. The importance of the overlap cannot be overstated. TPPF wields a powerful sword in the Texas capitol and as the budget case study showed, they are trending further away from public policy analysis and closer and closer to pure politics. The following pages illustrate how ALEC has successfully used TPPF to deliver cookie-cutter corporate laws to the Lone Star State, and how these ALEC model bills championed by their home-away-from home, the Texas 33 Public Policy Foundation protect corporate interests at the publics expense.

Issue

TPPF 2013-2014 Agenda TPPF recommends state and local spending increases only by the sum of population growth plus inflation, the growth in gross state product or the growth personal income, whichever is less. TPPF recommends requiring a supermajority vote in the state legislature to override Texass constitutional limits on government spending.

Limiting Government Spending

TPPF calls for allowing Texans to buy health insurance across state lines, offered by insurance companies in other states.

Opposing Health Care Reform

ALEC Model Bills ALECs Tax and Expenditure Limitation Act would amend the state constitution to set revenue and spending limits, by capping total expenditures by inflating the current years expenditures to account only for population growth and inflation. ALECs Super-Majority Act would amend the state constitution to require all tax and license fee increases or impositions be approved by two-thirds of all member s of each house of the legislature, except when there is insufficient revenue to pay interest on the states debt. ALECs Health Care Choice Act for States, allows for the purchase of health care from out of state insurers who are not licensed in the state of the purchaser, which could result in subpar policies not subject to state protections. ALECs Resolution Opposing Employer-Paid Health Care Mandates opposes efforts by state legislatures to mandate that private employers purchase health insurance for workers.

TPPF recommends eliminating all ALECs Freedom of Choice in Health state-level insurance mandates. Care Act would prohibit the legislature from requiring individuals to purchase health insurance, even though states like Texas require drivers to purchase auto insurance under the states financial responsibility law.

Issue

TPPF 2013-2014 Agenda

ALEC Model Bills

TPPF dedicated an entire section ALECs Resolution in Opposition to EPAs Regulation of Greenhouse Gases Attacking in its 2013-2014 agenda from Mobile Sources opposes a Environmental demonizing the Environmental Protections & Protection Agencys regulations, Supreme Court case allowing the EPA to Pollution including greenhouse gas limits, regulate carbon dioxide and greenhouse Regulation coal plant regulations, and air gases as pollutants. The ALEC resolution uses straw man arguments and other quality monitoring. rhetoric to dismiss climate change concerns. ALEC also published an entire pamphlet attacking environmental 34 regulation called the EPA Train Wreck. ALECs Intrastate Coal and Use Act would prevent the EPA from overruling state permits for coal mining and dirty coal products if all the companys coal operations are conducted within the borders of a single state (although air pollution crosses state lines). ALECs Resolution in Opposition of Carbon Dioxide Emission Standards opposes environmental protections on carbon dioxide emissions. ALECs State Withdrawal from Regional Climate Initiatives removes states from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative or the Western Climate Initiative, cap-and-trade programs to cut greenhouse gases and carbon-dioxide emissions. It uses language denying that climate changes exist and are manmade.

Denying Climate Change

TPPF questions the science of climate change, and urges federal lawmakers to implement a rigorous review of scientific facts dealing with climate change, along with calling for the suspension of all state programs that regulate greenhouse gases and federal mandates to reduce carbon dioxide.

Issue
Attacking Renewable Energy

ALEC Model Bills ALECs Electricity Freedom Act repeals renewable energy mandates and TPPF calls for the elimination of constitutes an attack on states with plans the Renewable Portfolio Standard. requiring companies to get a certain percentage of their electricity from renewable sources. ALECs Article V Repeal Amendment Resolution calls for a constitutional convention in order propose an amendment permitting the repeal of any federal law by the vote of two-thirds of state legislatures.

TPPF 2013-2014 Agenda

ALECs Resolution Reaffirming Tenth In the section entitled 10th Amendment Rights asserts that federal Amendment in TPPFs 2013- mandates violates the Tenth Amendment, 2014 agenda, TPPF calls interstate but fails to acknowledge the many compacts an effective way to express powers granted to Congress, regulate areas of mutual concern Advocating for including powers over interstate th of two or more states. It further The 10 commerce. states that Texas should examine Amendment the benefits of using ALECs Resolution Calling for the constitutional amendments aimed Congress of the United States to Call a at limiting government spending, Constitutional Convention Pursuant to including calling for a Article V of the United States urges constitutional convention. Congress to call a constitutional convention for the purpose of proposing a constitutional amendment that permits the repeal of any federal law or regulation by two-thirds of the state legislatures, which is dubbed the Madison Amendment (another ALEC model).

TPPF 2013-2014 Agenda ALEC Model Bills TPPF recommends that there ALEC has several model bills aimed at should be a measureable protecting corporations from liability for Protecting standard for a plaintiff in an an injured American in an asbestosCorporations in asbestos-related case to prove related case, including the Asbestos and Asbestos- negligence and that the causation Silica Claims Priorities Act, the related Claims standards for asbestos-related Asbestos Claims Transparency Act, claims should remain at the same and the Successor Asbestos-Related level as all toxic exposure claims. Liability Fairness Act. Deforming Public Pensions ALECs Public Employees Portable TPPF calls for new state workers Retirement Option (PRO) Act is a move to be moved into a risky definedtowards eliminating defined benefit contribution pension plan. pension plans for public employees, which better protects retirees.

Issue

ALECs Parent Trigger Act would a small group of parents to close TPPF calls for changes to in the allow public school for current and future Pushing Parent Texas Education Code to make it students, and turn the school into a Trigger easier to force a parent trigger charter school or require the state to use scenario. taxpayer dollars for vouchers to subsidize private tuition. ALECs Virtual Public Schools Act requires virtual or online education company courses to be recognized as public schools and require that such companies receive the same per pupil funding as traditional schools that provide classrooms, sports training facilities, lunch, and transportation, resulting in windfall profits for online 35 schools.

TPPF recommends expanding the funding for virtual schools in Pushing for Texas to give greater freedom to Virtual Schools private virtual education corporations.

Issue

TPPF 2013-2014 Agenda

ALEC Model Bills ALECs Family Education Tax Credit Program creates a tax paying corporations and individuals that give money to be used as scholarships to pay tuition and fees at private schools, reducing tax revenue for public schools and other public services. ALECs Parent Choice Scholarship Program Act-Universal Eligibility creates a voucher program to use taxpayer funds that would have been spent on public schools to subsidize private for-profit, religious, or other primary and secondary schools. ALECs Parental Choice Scholarship Accountability Act enables taxpayer money to subsidize for-profit, religious, or other private schools. ALECs Charter Schools Act would allow the state to grant charters to create and operate schools outside of traditional public schools, while also exempting these charter schools from state laws that apply to public schools. ALECs Resolution Supporting Private Scholarship Tax Credits urges tax cuts for corporations and others to subsidize non-public corporate schools through funding scholarships.

Privatizing Public Education

TPPF calls for Texas to increase competition in the Texas education system by implementing education scholarships, tax credits, and expanding charter schools and vouchers.

Issue

TPPF 2013-2014 Agenda

ALEC Model Bills ALECs Great Teachers and Leaders Act changes seniority rules that reward education and experience of teachers and allows tenure to be revoked based on limited measures of success without regard to underlying conditions in the schools or environment.

Attacking Teachers

ALECs Alternative Certification Act TPPF calls for radical attacks on attempts to allow students to be taught by teachers in Texas, including people who have no training in how to lowering the barriers for teacher teach children and the different ways kids certification, eliminating the learn at various ages and based on minimum salary a teacher must be different learning styles. This paves the paid based on experience, way for for-profit schools to pay discouraging school districts from teachers less than educators who are paying teachers with a masters actually trained in teaching. degree more money, and eliminating tenure rights. ALECs Career Ladder Opportunities Act and Teacher Quality and Recognition Demonstration Act undermines post-secondary education and tenure rights of teachers, placing more emphasis on tests (regardless of the underlying conditions in the schools or the socio-economic environment of the school district) than other established measures.

TPPF + ALEC Donors: A Preview

With a multi-million dollar budget, prominent building space and signage in downtown Austin, and the traditionally reliable support of prominent conservative lawmakers that also are members of ALEC, TPPF is accustomed to not having to answer for the ALEC cookie-cutter bills they support and promote in the Texas Legislature. Charting the maze of money that runs through Tea Party think tanks and industry front groups is a tedious yet illuminating exercise. The corporate dollars that prop up these entities often lead to highly questionable policy reports that support a predetermined outcome (often legislation) that benefits the donor at the publics expense. In the coming months, Progress Texas will release an additional detailed report on the financial trails that connect ALEC, TPPF, the State Policy Network, and other similar organizations in Texas and across the country. Heres a look ahead at some of the data weve already crunched: - TPPF has received at least $3,314,591 from the billionaire Koch brothers or the organizations they support in recent years. Of those dollars, $733,333 came directly from either the Koch family foundations or directly from Koch Industries. An additional $2,581,258 came from the Donors Trust & Donors Capital Fund, of which the Kochs are prominent members. - TPPF received nearly $300,000 from the Searle Freedom Trust between 2007 to 2011. The Searle Freedom Trust, which held over $135 million in assets at the end of 2010, has contributed millions to

major right-wing groups like the American Enterprise Institute, the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, and the Cato Institute. - Although TPPF claimed in 2008 that it spent nothing on lobbying, it told the IRS that it spent $981,869 on lobbying between 2009 and 2010. Although its 501(c)(4) arm was operational in 2011, its federal tax reports for neither that year nor 2012 have been made publicly available yet. However, forms filed with the state of Texas indicate that between 2011 and 2013, TPPF has spent at least $100,000 on lobbying the Texas Legislature largely on gifts, food, drinks, and transportation to Texas legislators and state offices. Given how much TPPF spent on lobbying before organizing a separate lobby arm, it is difficult to believe that its lobby spending actually went down as TPPFs profile in urging changes to Texas law rose, as the public disclosures thus far seem to indicate. - Moreover, according to TPPFs most recent public tax filing from 2011, it paid its executive corporate-level salaries that dwarf the rates paid for most other public interest groups in Austin (other than nonprofit hospitals). It spent a whopping $1.391 million of its $5.7 million budget on executive salaries. - TPPF paid its President, Brooke Rollins, total compensation of $317,555, and its Executive Director $234,738. TPPF actually paid the Director of its Center for Fiscal Policy, former Republican State House Appropriations Chairman Talmadge Heflin, $173,078, while TPPF complained about public employee salaries.

About the Report

This report TPPF + ALEC contains original research by Progress Texas and the Center for Media and Democracy. This report is part of an ongoing effort by Progress Texas to expose the corporate influence that ALEC and organizations like the Texas Public Policy Foundation have over the debate and enactment of public policy in the state of Texas. Parts of this report contain first-hand research gathered at ALECs Spring Task Force Summit, which was hosted in May of 2013 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and at a TPPF-hosted luncheon at the Texas Capitol that occurred on Wednesday, June 12, 2013. Questions and media inquiries concerning the information provided in this report should be directed towards Phillip Martin, Deputy Director for Progress Texas, at Phillip@ProgressTexas.org.

At left: The hidden lobby space inside the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, where lobbyists and legislators met to debate aid discuss model ALEC bills.

Endnotes
1

Texas Public Policy Foundation. Open Letter to the Texas Legislature on Spending and the Rainy Day Fund. 5/10/13. Accessed online: http://www.texaspolicy.com/center/fiscal-policy/reports/open-letter-texaslegislature-spending-and-rainy-day-fund
2

Kucinich, Jackie. Perry has close ties to conservative foundation. USA Today, 9/22/11. Accessed online: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2011-09-22/Perry-Texas-foundation/50520322/1
3

Report: AT&T led the way in 2013 Lege lobby spending. Houston Chronicle, 6/10/13. Accessed online: http://blog.chron.com/texaspolitics/2013/06/report-att-led-the-way-in-2013-lege-lobby-spending/
4

ALEC Exposed. AT&T. Accessed online: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/AT%26T

Idaho Spokesman-Review, 9/15/2013, http://m.spokesman.com/stories/2013/sep/15/idaho-freedomfoundations-charitable-status/Idaho Spokesman-Review, 9/15/2013, http://m.spokesman.com/stories/2013/sep/15/idaho-freedom-foundations-charitable-status/

6

Center for Media and Democracy/SourceWatch http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=State_Policy_Network

7

PR Watch, ALECexposed: List of Corporations and Special Interests that Underwrote ALEC's 40th Anniversary Meeting. 8/15/2013. Accessed online: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2013/08/12212/alecexposed-list-corporations-and-special-interestsunderwrote-alecs-40th-anniver
8

Sourcewatch: SPN Ties to ALEC. Accessed Online: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/SPN_Ties_to_ALEC

9

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=State_Policy_Network ALEC Exposed. ALEC Politicians. Online: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/ALEC_Politicians

10

11

Progress Texas. Progress Texas Releases ALEC Exposed in Texas. 1/17/12. Accessed onl ine: http://progresstexas.org/blog/progress-texas-releases-alec-exposed-texas

12

Progress Texas. 9 TX Republicans, Last 3 TX Democrats Leave ALEC (Updated). 8/16/12. Accessed online: http://progresstexas.org/blog/9-tx-republicans-last-3-tx-democrats-leave-alec-updated
13

Progress Texas. Texas Public Policy Foundation Rushes to Defend ALEC. 5/17/12. Accessed online: http://progresstexas.org/blog/texas-public-policy-foundation-rushes-defend-alec
14

ALEC Exposed. Tax and Expenditure Limitation Act. Accessed online: http://www.alecexposed.org/w/images/c/c7/8G2-Tax_and_Expenditure_Limitation_Act_Exposed.pdf
15

ALEC Exposed. Super-Majority Act. Accessed online: http://www.alecexposed.org/w/images/5/5c/8G1Super-Majority_Act_Exposed.pdf

16

Texas Public Policy Action. Home page. Accessed online: http://www.texasaction.com/

17

Weissert, Will. Perry to Hold Ceremony for Water Bill Signing. Associated Press, 5/28/13. Accessed online: http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/politics/Perry-to-Hold-Ceremony-for-Water-Bill-Signing209140141.html
18

Texas lawmakers boost state spending. Associated Press, 3/31/13. Accessed online: http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2013/03/31/texas-lawmakers-boost-state-spending/
19

Summary of 2014-15 Conference Committee Report on Senate Bill 1. Texas Legislative Budget B oard. Accessed online: http://www.lbb.state.tx.us/Appropriations_Bills/83/2014-15%20MOF%20Tables.pdf
20

Batheja, Aman. Pitts, Williams Accuse Wall Street Journal of Fuzzy Math. Texas Tribune, 6/12/13. Accessed online: http://www.texastribune.org/2013/06/12/pitts-and-williams-accuse-wsj-fuzzy-budget-math/
21

Texas Public Policy Foundation. Conservative Coalition Letter to Governor Perry. 5/29/13. Accessed online: http://www.texaspolicy.com/center/fiscal-policy/reports/conservative-coalition-letter-governor-perry
22

Lisa Graves, Center for Media and Democracy, Wall Street Journal Defends ALEC without Disclosing Deep Ties of Editorial Board Member Stephen Moore, PRWatch.org 8/19/13 http://www.prwatch.org/news/2013/08/12215/wall-street-journal-defends-alec-without-disclosing-deep-tieseditorial-board-mem
23

Texas Goes Sacramento. Wall Street Journal, editorial, 6/7/13. Accessed online: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324299104578527193464764384.html

24

Root, Jay. Amid Criticism Perry Defends State Budget. Texas Tribune, 6/10/13. Accessed online: http://www.texastribune.org/2013/06/10/amid-criticism-perry-defends-state-budget/
25

Texas Public Policy Foundation. Conservative Groups Agree Not a Conservative Budget. 6/13/13. Accessed online: http://www.texaspolicy.com/center/fiscal-policy/blog/conservative-groups-agree-notconservative-budget
26

Texas Public Policy Foundation. About Us. Accessed online: http://www.texaspolicy.com/about Texas Public Policy Foundation. Conservative Coalition Letter to Governor Perry.

27

28

The Buckeye Institute. Fiscal Restraint and Local Government Reform Needed, Not More Spending. 7/9/12. Accessed online: http://buckeyeinstitute.org/the-liberty-wall/2012/07/09/fiscal-restraint-and-localgovernment-reform-needed-not-more-spending/
29

The Goldwater Institute. Rainy Day Fund appeals to some. 1/28/07. Accessed online: http://goldwaterinstitute.org/article/rainy-day-raid-appeals-some-1
30 31

http://townhall254.gregabbott.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/GregAbbottsWorkingTexansPlan.pdf Abbott Proposes Limits to Spending and Rainy Day Fund. Texas Tribune, 10/28/13. Accessed online: http://www.texastribune.org/2013/10/28/abbott-proposes-limits-spending-and-rainy-day-fund/
32

Peacock, Bill and Nancy Druart, eds. Keeping Texas Competitive: A Legislators Guide to the Issues 2013-2014. Texas Public Policy Foundation, 10/1/12. Accessed online: http://www.texaspolicy.com/sites/default/files/documents/2013-14-LegeGuide_2.pdf
33

Text of specific model bills is from ALEC Exposed website run by the Center for Media and Democracy.

34

Brendan Fischer, Center for Media and Democracy, Dirty Han ds: 77 ALEC Bills in 2013 Advance a Big Oil, Big Ag Agenda, PRWatch.org 8/1/13, http://www.prwatch.org/node/12193
35

Brendan Fischer, Center for Media and Democracy, Cashing in on Kids: 139 ALEC Bills in 2013 Promote a Private, For-Profit Education Model, PRWatch.org, 7/13/13 http://www.prwatch.org/news/2013/07/12175/cashing-kids139-alec-bills-2013-promote-private-profiteducation-model