Clancy is co-founder of Citizen Connect and board member of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund. Citizen Connect is an initiative of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund, which also operates The Fulcrum.
It’s a very strange dynamic. The vast majority of Americans think our “us vs. them” political system is a threat to the nation and yet every election cycle many of us throw money at the problem.
According to the Federal Election Commission total spending on our presidential election grew by over 130 percent between 2016 and 2020. The same trend can be seen in congressional races with spending up more than 110 percent from 2016 to 2020 and higher still for the 2022 midterms. To make matters worse, a fast growing source of contributions is “dark money,” making it hard to know who is behind the donations and what strings may be attached.
It’s often said that you get what you pay for, but in politics that isn’t the case for most Americans. Instead of getting more for spending more, we’re actually getting less. We expect elected officials to focus on things like keeping us safe and protecting the American dream, but that’s not what happens in Washington. Instead too many politicians spend their time making excuses, pointing fingers and grandstanding. Data from the Congressional Record supports this fact — we are paying more and more to fund elected officials who accomplish less and less.
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How does this happen? One major piece of the puzzle is the big money that both parties are beholden to. If you’re already a special interest fat cat, government inaction isn’t a problem — in fact it protects the status quo that keeps you on top. Another sad fact is that finger pointing works for elected officials. When they play the blame game (and we fall for it) they aren’t held accountable for delivering results and can claim to be heroes just for “saving us” from the other side. We wouldn’t tolerate such blatant cronyism and lame excuses in our professional or family life, but the political parties have honed a playbook that does the trick every time.
So is there anything we can really do about it? This brings to mind the saying "insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." That means we need to change our behavior if we want anything to improve. One powerful way to do that is to take all or part of the money you’re considering contributing to your favorite (or least disliked) candidates and donate it to nonpartisan organizations dedicated to holding politicians accountable and giving power back to mainstream citizens.
Over $14 billion was spent on the 2020 federal election cycle. If even 10 percent of that was invested in authentically putting the country first it would be a game changer. That’s exactly what I decided to do in 2024 — focus my giving on organizations pursuing pragmatic ways to fix our toxic politics instead of throwing more money at partisan campaigns.
So which initiatives and organizations? Only you can decide what’s aligned with your personal values and priorities, but a great place to determine that is Citizen Connect. It’s a platform for more than 600 nonpartisan organizations working to address our broken political system by forging common ground, fixing our election process and providing quality civic education. These organizations are run by dedicated citizens from across the political spectrum — Republicans, Democrats and independents working together to heal our nation. I’ll highlight a few great examples among many worthy of your consideration.
Veterans for All Voters is an amazing organization that’s focused on making sure veterans have more voice in politics through reforms like open primaries. Mormon Women for Ethical Government seeks “to inspire women of faith to be ambassadors of peace who transcend partisanship and courageously advocate for ethical government.” The Listen First Project coordinates and champions the activities of hundreds of organizations across the country working to find common ground across differences. And iCivics supports nonpartisan civic education by offering creative learning tools including games and simulations for the classroom and beyond.
If we think our political system is broken it’s time for us to put our money where our mouth is — even if our means are modest. The organizations on Citizen Connect are a great way to put your donations to good use. Consider it a personal investment in protecting democracy and a way to support people working to build America up, not tear it down. By the way, I co-founded Citizen Connect and we need funding too, but I’d rather have you explore the incredible organizations on our platform. They are doing such important and inspiring work and I’m confident you will agree. Here’s a 90-second video that shows what the civic renewal community is all about and why you should support it today!
