The Price Tag on Democracy: How Corporate Money Is Corrupting Our Politics

Where greed meets governance, and nobody wins (except the people writing the checks)

It's 2025. Sometimes the world feels as corrupt as it must have been before we had FOIAs and a fifth estate that actually dug deep and reported the news (not that we have much of those in 2025 either, but there is good journalism out there if you look). The blatant corruption is overwhelming, and I believe it starts from the top with a permission structure flowing downward. The fact that special interests can basically get anything they want is, frankly, bullshit.

Citizens United: The Beginning of the End?

I believe many of our problems trace back to the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United. Allowing corporations to give unlimited money was a disaster that everyone predicted at the time, yet it happened anyway. If we do end up in a cyberpunk dystopia, a lot of the blame could go to that court decision.

It's so insidious. This system incentivizes no one to bother changing anything because all politicians get tons of money from these corporate interests. Now that "corporations are people" with speech rights, and political donations are "speech" which cannot be abridged by the state, the government "for and by the people" has morphed into "for and by the corporations."

Potential Solutions in a Broken System

There have been some proposed solutions, such as a constitutional amendment—which would be a heavy lift. I always liked the idea of making politicians wear their sponsors' logos like NASCAR drivers. It might not solve the problem, but it would make it harder to ignore. Maybe politicians wouldn't take money from certain groups, and that could be enough.

That we have a "dark money" problem in America says a lot. There should be no such thing as dark money. Every dollar spent on electioneering should be traceable to its donor. We shouldn't see vague groups like "Americans for a Safe Future" (which I just made up and may exist—I'm not picking on them specifically). Who the heck is that? I want to know that John Smith gave $250k to fund ads about how the police need rocket-propelled grenades to keep us safer.

You may think I'm joking, but there is nothing legally stopping that from happening. (Though I am not a lawyer and there may be a law preventing local police from using RPGs…) And this has led to a lot of BS at every level—from presidential campaigns where spending $250 million apparently gets you a special job, down to local city elections.

A Tale of Local Corruption

Let me tell you a short story. There was a town in Florida which owned its own power utility. It wasn't the best—they had no online payments due to the cost and size of the utility, and prices were a little higher than average. The town was surrounded by the service area of Florida Power and Light (FPL), one of the largest utilities in the US. So there was always talk of selling the city utility to FPL for lower rates.

After the Citizens United decision, FPL began investing heavily in City Council races. What used to cost maybe $10k to get elected suddenly had over $100k in spending. The corporation was giving money to political committees, which spent money to elect candidates running on selling the city's utility to the company that had funded them. How is this not seen as corruption?

FPL might have promised better service and lower costs to the city ratepayers, but come on. (Since the sale, rates have gone up from FPL several times and it's now more expensive than the old city utility ever was, though I imagine the city's costs would have increased too if they had stayed in the game.)

That was all perfectly legal. At the time, I reached out to Florida and national reporters to see if they wanted to cover this story and the (unintended? intended?) costs of the Citizens United decision, but I never heard back. There was never any coverage outside of the local area.

The Going Rate for a Politician

How many other issues like this exist? How many other politicians are bought and paid for? It's not too expensive to buy a politician: a few donations to their campaign, some PAC money, maybe a trip or two to "learn more about the industry"—perhaps on a cruise where they can bring their family. Where does it end? When does corruption start, and why do we have so much trouble calling it out?

I honestly have no idea how to fix this other than to stop allowing campaigning like we do now, and maybe compress the election timeframe like other countries do—so we don't have two years of running but just a few weeks. I do know getting money out of politics will help a lot though. Pre-Citizens United, things were not perfect, but elections sure cost a lot less money for all involved parties.

The Latest Outrage: Paving Paradise

This was kind of a rant, but I saw this article in the Florida Phoenix about legislators wanting to pave every rural spot left in the state, and I wanted to hit something. Craig Pittman is one of my go-to writers for good Florida politics takes. He does a great job highlighting why people should be upset about certain issues and breaks them down logically.

Just how far are these corrupt people willing to go to sell out their constituents? Have they no honor? Have they no shame? (It seems like the answer to both is no.) All this kind of politician wants is to get theirs. That's fine in private business, but if you're doing the work of the people, you need to hold yourself—and be held—to a higher standard. It really grinds my gears when politicians pretend to be acting for the greater good when they're just lining up their next job for after they leave politics.

Has Civil Service Lost Its Way?

Maybe there has never been a time or government where politicians were honest and doing the right thing for the people. We've changed as a society over the years, so perhaps that kind of honorable civil service has vanished from our shores. The budget cuts aren't as unpopular as I feel they should be. The graft and corruption are in plain view (Tesla ad on the White House lawn, DeSantis using taxpayer money to illegally advertise against citizen ballot initiatives, and so much more). People have become complacent and feel their government doesn't work for them because the people in government aren't working for them.

It would still suck but wouldn't be as bad if people weren't so quick to believe that because they are starving the government, it is not functioning as well, and because it is not functioning as well, it sucks, so why bother having a government anyway? It's so shortsighted. I do believe this era of smaller government we are in will backfire, and people will see that government is actually important and we want a strong and independent civil service.

Instead of blaming the politicians who make policy and decisions, it's more fashionable to attack middle-class civil servants. I don't get it. People have lost the plot on what good governance is. The accelerationist inside me is not saddened by this change, but I do not want people to get hurt, and these cuts to government services have already killed people (maybe not in the USA yet, but give it time). Will this wake people up? Who knows.

Taking Back Our Democracy

So I hope I've shown a little bit about how corruption and corporate influence go hand in hand. There's another bill going through the NC legislature right now (SB 261) which will do another giveaway to energy utility corporations and allow them to pollute more. This is not only in Florida and NC. There are tons of this kind of bill all over.

This is why we need advocacy and grassroots power to make change in the world. We need people like you to stand up and be heard, or we will be left behind. The rich are already getting richer, in part due to policies bought and paid for by them and their friends. We can counter this, but it is hard. It involves work and can be dangerous in times like these. But if we don't do it, who will? No one will save us; we have to save ourselves.

The good news is, we can do it. We fight the battles to get less of this BS passed into law. We need to hold elected officials accountable and move away from party loyalty. If your rep is a Republican and you always vote GOP, maybe it's time not to vote GOP for a cycle or two. If you don't like what the politicians are doing, party regardless, vote them the F out. It's not rocket science. Do not be more loyal to a political party than to what your needs are.

If you want clean air, don't vote for the candidate taking money from the smog industry. If you want clean water, don't vote for the guys dumping sewage into the river. It's not complicated. But most of all, speak up. You don't need to do everything or go march six days a week. Just talking about these issues is almost subversive sometimes. They don't want you talking about it and spreading word around because it's harder for them then to get their kickbacks and buyouts. Just shining a light on the corruption can help. Like shining a light on cockroaches causes them to run away. Same thing, invertebrates are going to invertebrate.