AT&T; promotes Prop. 93
The president of AT&T; California is urging employees to support Proposition 93, the term limits measure on Tuesday’s ballot championed by Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, whose 2006 law allowing the telecommunications company into the lucrative cable TV market could be worth billions of dollars.
In a letter e-mailed to 40,000 employees this week, President Ken McNeely wrote: “I believe that Prop. 93, which AT&T; has supported, strikes a good balance between term limits and enabling legislators to develop more expertise for California.”
Proposition 93, with a campaign financed heavily by public employee unions, legislators and corporations including AT&T;, would allow Nunez and many other lawmakers to run for office again this year rather than be forced out.
Nunez, a Los Angeles Democrat, wrote the law that permits AT&T; and other phone companies to compete against cable operators for pay television customers. His 2006 bill won bipartisan support after a hard-fought lobbying campaign that pitted AT&T; and Verizon against cable companies. After the bill passed the Legislature, AT&T; helped pay for full-page newspaper ads praising the speaker’s “leadership and vision.”
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the legislation into law in September 2006.
Charles Elson, director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance in Newark, Del., said corporate executives occasionally urge employees to vote a certain way on matters of direct importance to a company.
AT&T; executives “must have felt that there’s some connection” between the term limits measure and AT&T;’s success, he said.
“I’ve always thought that it’s frankly better for business to stay out of its employees’ involvement in the political process,” Elson said.
AT&T; spokesman James Peterson said in an e-mail statement Friday that the company “has always encouraged our employees to actively participate in the civic process.” He noted that McNeely’s communique referred workers to the California secretary of state’s website for more information.
Proposition 93 would shorten overall terms in the Legislature from 14 to 12 years but allow legislators to serve all of those years in the same house. It also would allow 34 legislators who otherwise must exit later this year to stay until they have served a total of 12 years in their current house.
Nunez and Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata (D-Oakland) spearheaded last year’s effort to move California’s presidential primary election from June to February. If Proposition 93 passes, they and other legislators who would have been termed out will be able to run for reelection on the June ballot.
No on Prop. 93 campaign spokesman Kevin Spillane called the AT&T; letter “more evidence of how committed the major special interests with business before the Legislature are to supporting Prop. 93.”
He said it contradicts proponents’ assertion that by freeing legislators from having to constantly seek a different office, Proposition 93 would strengthen the hand of legislators in their dealings with lobbyists.
“In truth,” said Spillane, “the special interests are supporting Prop. 93 to win favor with powerful incumbent politicians.”
The opposition campaign is funded largely by Republican Steve Poizner, the state insurance commissioner; the state prison guards union; and a national nonprofit term-limits group. Richard Stapler, spokesman for the Yes on Prop. 93 campaign, said opponents “take a cynical view of the process.”
“The other way to look at it is, if you’re working with the Legislature you want to be working with legislators who are experts in policy issues,” he said.
“If you can gain more experience, you can craft better public policy,” said Stapler, “and bad public policy affects every person and every business in California.”
AT&T; is a major player in Sacramento. Since 2005, it has donated more than $5 million to politicians and parties, including $250,000 to the Yes on Prop. 93 campaign.
The firm has spent nearly $30 million on lobbying the Legislature since 2005 and plays frequent host to legislators and staff at meals, concerts and sports events. Each April for several years, AT&T; has paid the costs of the “Speaker’s Cup,” a lavish golf fundraiser at Pebble Beach.
