How to Find Out Which Politicians Are Financially Backed by Cops

[LiberalArkie]

Aaron Fernando, a 19-year-old honors student at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, already knew political donations from police unions and law enforcement PACs were bad news from his work in the political realm. “I'm not the first one to talk about cop money, people [in the criminal justice space] have been talking about it for a long time,” Fernando told VICE. “I think it's immoral to take this money from these oppressive groups. People on Twitter have been calling it blood money, which I think is pretty accurate.”

Fernando’s game-changing move, however, was that he compiled a list of New York City Democratic politicians who’d taken that “cop money” this election cycle, and then brandished it online to hold them accountable. “I made this thread where I was comparing the statements that the politicians made about George Floyd and the protests,” he said. “Then I'd quote-tweet that tweet and post "Diane Savino took this much money this year from cops," kind of a stark contrast between what they're saying and what money they're taking.” Then, on May 30, he released the full spreadsheet, titled “Who’s Taking Cop Money?”

Fernando said he actually created the spreadsheet in his spare time, prior to the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis Police Department officer Derek Chauvin. But when he saw the anti-cop backlash Floyd’s murder sparked, he felt it was the right time to release the information.

“I expected nothing,” Fernando said. “I expected no politician would care, I expected nothing was going to happen. But then the reaction was massive, people really, really cared about their elected officials taking this money.” Once incumbent New York State assemblywoman Aravella Simotas announced on May 30 that she would redistribute $5,350 in donations from police-affiliated groups to bail funds and other local organizations fighting mass incarceration, in Fernando’s words, “all the dominos fell.”

Link to tweet

Snip

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/bv8nj3/how-to-find-out-which-politicians-are-financially-backed-by-cops

[Wellstone ruled]

1. Sun light and Exposure are the only thing that

makes changes to the Campaign Finance System.

[crickets]

2. Fernando has found a smart way to track down this important information,

and more than that, shown others how they can do the same. Kudos.