Limit the influence of money, power brokers, and foreign interests in American politics

A nation that allows its democracy to be auctioned to the highest bidder is no longer a free and fair democracy. The Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision in 2010 ruled that corporations are allowed to make independent expenditures in federal elections. This decision enabled unchecked corporate influence on the American political process and led to the explosive growth of Super PACs, which now channel tens of millions of dollars into elections nationwide, drowning out the voices of the people in a deluge of money.

It is not enough to decry this corruption—we must act. We cannot allow the wealth of the few to silence the will of the many. Similarly, foreign governments must never be allowed to influence American policy by infiltrating our political system from within. 

Project 2029 is committed to crafting policy proposals that limit the influence of money, power brokers, and foreign interests in American politics, including:

1. Supporting individual states, either through their legislatures or citizen-led ballot initiatives, in limiting corporate political activity and dark money spending. This includes supporting Montana’s Transparent Election Ballot Initiative in 2026, which serves as a national model for negating Citizens United’s consequences. If states define corporations as lacking the power to spend in politics, any court-enshrined right to do so becomes meaningless. The success of such ballot initiatives will help to reverse the effects of the disastrous Citizens United ruling, state by state, nationwide. 

2. Amending U.S. Arms Transfer Policy to ensure that American defense and foreign policy spending promotes national security by serving the welfare of service members, human rights, and the American public over the interests of private military contractors and authoritarian regimes abroad. Today’s arms-transfer decisions are heavily shaped by defense contractors and foreign governments lobbying for weapons sales, even when those transfers undermine human rights or long-term U.S. security, necessitating this reform.

3. Resuming enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which bars U.S. companies and their agents from offering anything of value to foreign officials to secure or maintain business. Stringent enforcement of the FCPA helps prevent bribery and illicit dealings, and ensures U.S. companies and their representatives act with integrity abroad.

4. Directing the DOJ’s National Security Division, along with the Treasury, to audit AIPAC’s funding, lobbying, and foreign coordination and decide if its activities require registration under the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938 (FARA). This action is overdue, given AIPAC’s role in pushing Congress to send large-scale military aid to Israel, shaping foreign-policy decisions, and influencing U.S. elections by bankrolling candidates who serve their foreign interests.

5. Imposing economic and logistical sanctions on foreign individuals and entities engaged or complicit in corrupting the American political system from within.

6. Rescinding Executive Order 14192, which supercharged corporate capture by forcing agencies to repeal ten existing regulations for every new regulation they propose. This structural pressure against necessary and appropriate regulation tilts power toward corporations and entrenched interests that push for deregulatory favors.

7. Rescinding Executive Order 14255, which prioritizes the interests of large corporations over public safeguards, environmental standards, and democratic accountability by fast-tracking billion-dollar projects and weakening regulatory oversight.

8. Issuing an Executive Order to prevent the use of taxpayer funds, directly or indirectly, for the construction, renovation, or operation of professional sports venues. Over the past several decades, tens of billions of taxpayer dollars have been earmarked to subsidize stadium and arena construction projects, despite billion-dollar professional sports leagues and franchises exclusively reaping the benefits. An overwhelming amount of empirical findings demonstrate that this spending fails to deliver promised economic benefits and undermines fiscal responsibility. This order must instruct appropriate federal agencies to condition all applicable grants to local or state entities on a certification that no public funds be used to support stadium or arena projects for privately owned sports franchises. Additionally, the Treasury shall issue guidance and/or initiate rulemaking clarifying that municipal bonds used for pro-sports-venue construction, renovation, or operations do not qualify for tax-exempt status.