
Neal Simon Discusses New Book and Democracy Reform at CLC Event

Campaign Legal Center (CLC) hosted “Virtual Book Event: Neal Simon in Conversation with Paul Smith,” about Neal Simon’s new book “Contract to Unite America.” The book capitalizes on personal insight from Simon’s 2018 U.S. Senate campaign to propose 10 reforms to help reform our democracy.
Many of the proposed reforms—like ranked choice voting, independent redistricting commissions and greater campaign finance transparency—are issues that CLC works on.
During the conversation CLC’s Paul Smith, Vice President of Litigation and Strategy, and Simon discussed how our campaign finance system incentivizes candidates to serve wealthy special interests rather than their districts’ voters.
Nine-out-of-ten races for the House of Representatives are not competitive in the general election due in large part to the prevalence of super PAC money. As a result, their districts’ voters lose out on opportunities to hold their elected officials accountable.
We need real transparency about who is spending big money on elections to reduce the influence of wealthy special interests.