The bipartisan "super committee" created by the debt ceiling deal is comprised of lawmakers who have received big bucks from special interest groups, according to a report by MapLight. The committee is tasked with finding at least $1.2 trillion in deficit cuts over ten years.
In total, the twelve members appointed to the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction got nearly $64.5 million from special interests groups over the past decade, with legal firms donating about $31.5 million and Wall Street firms donating about $11.2 million.
Of that $11.2 million, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase donated approximately $2 million combined.
The members appointed to the committee are Sens. Pat Toomey (R-PA), Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Rob Portman (R-OH), Patty Murray (D-WA), John Kerry (D-MA), and Max Baucus (D-MT) and Reps. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), Fred Upton (R-MI), Dave Camp (R-MI), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Xavier Becerra (D-CA), and Jim Clyburn (D-SC).
Democratic and liberal groups donated the third most amount of money, with about $9.6 million in political contributions, and the health industry donated the fourth most, with about $9.3 million.
Club for Growth, a conservative free market group, donated more money than any other organization, contributing a combined $990,066 to the twelve lawmakers. The vast majority of that money went to Sen. Toomey.
Microsoft Corp. donated the second most, with $810,100.
The six Republicans on the committee have signed a pledge by Americans for Tax Reform to vote against any tax increases.
If the panel deadlocks, or Congress fails to approve its recommendations, the debt-limit deal calls for painful automatic cuts of $1.2 trillion to the military and health care for the elderly, designed to be so politically costly to both sides as to compel a compromise.
With AFP.
