Walker Wildmon
AFA vice president
Editor’s note: This column was first posted on The Stand, AFA’s website (afa.net/thestand) in March 2019. Unfortunately, nothing appears to have changed.
October 2020 – Year after year, conservatives are frustrated by the lack of change in Washington. Conservatives even elected Donald Trump as president in order to shake up the system, yet Congress maintains its low approval rating and lack of progress on major issues.
Policy issues such as illegal immigration, abortion, and health care have gone untouched because of the stagnation in Washington. You might ask why Congress is unproductive despite the fact that these issues are top priorities for voters.
The simple answer is that special interest money has brought Washington to a standstill.
How so? The status quo has a financial stronghold on our politicians.
One example is the issue of illegal immigration.
For decades, illegal aliens have abused our system and undermined working-class Americans. They’ve been allowed to do this because Congress refuses to close various loopholes in our system and secure our border. Big business has benefited from this illegal labor. Major corporations hire illegal immigrants and pay them extremely low wages in order to increase their profit margin. These same corporations refuse to hire American citizens because they would have to pay them wages [defined and monitored by U.S. law].
The Pew Research Center predicts there are nearly 8 million illegal aliens in the U.S. workforce. One of the main reasons Congress refuses to clamp down on this problem is that the same corporations which benefit from illegal labor are also writing checks to many of our politicians. The result? Congress sits on its hands and allows the border crisis to continue as big corporations continue to enrich themselves.
Another example is abortion.
In 2018 alone, Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest baby-killing mill, gave over $490,000 to candidates running for federal office. The vast majority were Democrats. And despite the outcry from millions of Americans that abortion must end, the baby killing continues. Why? Because many politicians are beholden to the abortion industry. The most corrupt fact of this is that Planned Parenthood receives over $5 billion in taxpayer funds each year. They then turn around and fund politicians who protect their baby-killing industry.
The last example is health care.
In 2009 President Obama and the Democrats passed the Affordable Care Act, which created a government-run health insurance marketplace. One would assume private insurance companies would fight this tooth and nail. If successful, the government-run insurance plan, also known as Obamacare, would become a competitor to private insurance companies. What did Democrats do to keep the private insurance companies quiet? They offered massive subsidies to private insurance companies. Why would private companies fight Obamacare when they can make money from it in the form of subsidies? Private insurance companies are now addicted to the almighty government dollar.
These are very important issues facing our country, and there are many factors driving the stagnation in Washington. One thing we can agree on is that special interest money has caused lawmakers to become less focused on their constituents and more focused on what their donors think. After all, for many, it is all about getting reelected. How do you get reelected? In large part, money.
There are various solutions to this problem with special interest money.
I would argue that we don’t need more laws to regulate campaign finance but instead, we need a more informed citizenry. More laws will just create more loopholes. Much of this information that we’ve discussed is publicly available at ivoterguide.com.
If we voters will just do our homework, learn where our representatives receive campaign money, and adjust our voting habits accordingly, we would have a much better country. 
