The interest group I chose to research is a civil rights group called the National Organization for Women.
The groups main focuses and current lobbying interests are keeping abortion legal, reproductive rights, economic justice for women, ending violence against women, racial justice, LGBTQI+ rights, and constitutional equality to ensure women get explicit protections in the United States Constitution.
They do not have any outside game tactics such as mass demonstrations or boycotts planned at the moment, but they do have a PAC page that has their federal endorsements for 2021. Right now they have endorsements for Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, Melanie DArrigo, and Shontel Brown. In the 2020 presidential election, they endorsed Elizabeth Warren. They also have online virtual panels with speakers.
The NOWs main recipient of funds goes to the group Vote for Equality. They gave them the most out of the whole 2019-2020 cycle with $482,283. Joe Biden comes in at second with $6,787, however the money came from individuals rather than the NOW PAC. One hundred percent of the recipients are also democrats. This bit of information supports their action to fund Vote for Equality, a group dedicated to flipping the Senate majority from red to blue. Under the lobbying tab, the NOW has not reported any lobbying the federal government or specific bills.
A group that opposes the NOW would be the National Right to Life organization. This group is a religious interest group. They are anti-abortion while the NOW is pro-choice and fight to keep abortion legal.
I believe this group can be very powerful when they allocate their resources correctly. It seems that they have not been as active in funding candidates or lobbying since the first few years of their group in 1992. Although the graph shows an upward trend for more funding in the coming years. Since their focus seems to be more on endorsing candidates for Congress, I hope to see successes and changes in their favor from those elected democratic members.
I personally think that interest groups undermine democracy because the biggest interest groups represent the narrow and special interests of wealthier, more educated, and privileged groups disproportionately to smaller groups that fight for more broad humanitarian issues. Due to the inequality to access the same resources and network connections, it threatens the democratic standard of a representational and politically equal democracy. I have little faith in regulations on interest groups because loopholes make them obsolete, like the use of anonymous dark money.
Works Cited:
2021 federal endorsements. NOW PAC. (n.d.). Retrieved October 19, 2021, from https://www.nowpac.org/2021-federal-endorsements.
Issues. National Organization for Women. (n.d.). Retrieved October 19, 2021, from https://now.org/issues/.
National Organization for Women Profile: Summary. OpenSecrets. (n.d.). Retrieved October 19, 2021, from https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/national-organization-for-women/summary?id=D000000641.
Vote for equality. Vote For Equality. (2020, September 30). Retrieved October 19, 2021, from https://voteforequality.us/.
