Presidential Candidates: A Case Study

Ever since the Citizens United decision made by the Supreme court, an unlimited amount of money has been poured into supporting candidates for president. We need to enact a new amendment to stop major corporations from limitlessly funding candidates to heavily influence the American system and regulate the amount of money given to presidential candidates.

The Citizens United decision allowed many wealthy people and capitalists to influence election to help elect presidential candidates whom they support. In 2012, billionaires, corporations and even foreign donations were sent in to take down the Democrats (Hamilton, "The Citizens United Ruling Will Increase Corruption in the US Government."). Typically, those with more money would be able to give them an advantage. Republicans tend to be right winged, meaning that they support government free regulations, focusing more on business. With an absurd amount of money that surpasses that the Democrats can muster, Republicans would be able to easily cover the cost for running for office. By being able to out fund their opponents, wealthy people
would be able to easily get their candidate to be elected

Not only does it allows the wealthy to influence elections, it also steers legislative actions in their favor. Those who once never donated money now were able to donate money discretely without having their identity disclosed, causing Congress members to carefully decide on their stance on subject matters (Sanders et al. "A Constitutional Amendment Is Necessary to Restore Democracy."). Before the Citizens United decision, politicians in Congress would make decision based on morals and ethics to determine what is best for their state and country. However, after the decision, corporations would determine if those same congress members would stay in their seats. Fearing the possible retaliation of huge increase in spendings to influence politics to overthrow them, they become puppets to keep their position.

Unlimited donations will aid candidates’ cause of slandering opponents in negativity, causing their obstacles to be easily trodden over.
As TV stations looked to earn a better revenue, they look towards political advertising where politicians who spend the most money would be able to secure stations to endlessly show ads supporting them or negatively against opponents (Nichols, "The Citizens United Decision Will Increase Negative Political Ads."). People would not care about the consequence in their actions as long as they are able to earn easy extra money. All the advertising times would be bought up by politicians to shine a negative light against opponents, with those spending the most, having more time. This would be mutually beneficial to TV stations and candidates, but would cause a one sidedness as only those heavy supported by the rich would have a bigger
influence.

People would disagree upon the claims stated above, saying money will do nothing. Some would claim that money given by the wealthy would not affect elections, congress, and definitely not cause corruption. However, given how in human nature, there exist greed, fear, and corruption, everything will go downhill, leaving the majority with no say. Money in this world means power. Those who go against or does not bow down to money would suffer greatly, even politicians well liked by the public. We need to reverse the Citizens United decision to prevent a disaster where the government will no longer be for the people, but for the rich and powerful.