Big Food and Big Ag have raised millions of dollars to defeat state GMO labelling initiatives and a Maui County voter initiative that seeks to temporarily ban GMO farming
1. SOS – Please help Colorado and Oregon – call to action
2. Nearly $8 million raised to defeat Maui GMO ballot initiative
3. More money, fewer facts: Final week of Oregon’s GMO labeling race
4. Oregon: Exposing the myths of the Anti-Measure 92 letter to physicians
1. SOS – Please help Colorado and Oregon
Label GMOs
29 October 2014
[Excerpts only]
The election is in less than ONE week. That means we have less than ONE week to make sure the [Grocery Manufacturers Association] GMA and poison producing companies don't win again because they have money to spread fear-mongering misinformation to confuse voters who really want labeling. And make no mistake... they are masters at it….
Colorado and Oregon need help and they need it now. If you don't live in California, Washington, Oregon or Colorado, it's really hard to understand what it's like to be carpetbombed with ads, watching support that was high eke away because our electoral system allows lying in political elections.
The ONLY thing we have is us.
And right now, we need the whole country to help make calls.
We must win! and we can with you. Please help.
Do you only have a little time to help? Make only 5 calls. If you have more time, make more calls. It’s so gratifying to get someone at the other end of the phone who doesn’t know about GMOs and you educate them to vote YES!
Please join us in making 2014 the year that we have massive wins for labeling. Call from the privacy of your home. Do it alone or invite some friends over for a “Bringing Down The Junk Food Meanies” party. All they need is a cell phone and a laptop to have fun.
They need us NOW!
PLEASE DONATE AND MAKE CALLS!
A note from Colorado:
First, a big thanks to the over 180 volunteers who have been calling Colorado voters making sure they have the facts about 105! We have identified 1000s of voters who have said they will vote YES on 105!
If you haven’t signed up for a shift, we’ve made it as easy as possible for you to get involved. THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING YOU CAN DO FOR THE CAMPAIGN THIS WEEK!! We need you to help us make 25 calls to identify supporters. On Friday, we will be matching the list of supportive voters with those who haven’t yet returned their ballot and be sure to contact them again so their vote is counted. We can only win this by identifying as many 105 supporters as possible! We can only identify supporters with your help!
It's easy. You can make calls from anywhere you have a computer and phone. Just watch this 16 minute video and you will have all of the information you need to make calls anytime between 11:00 – 8:00 Mountain Time.
https://vimeo.com/110293928
If you have any questions, please contact Whitney at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
To help Oregon go here:
http://oregonrighttoknow.ngpvanhost.com/form/-4582123058710116608?ms=E.EN-O-NDA.NAT.MAIN_SIGNUP
2. Nearly $8 million raised to defeat Maui GMO ballot initiative
By Anita Hofschneider
Honolulu Civil Beat, October 28, 2014
http://www.civilbeat.com/2014/10/nearly-8-million-raised-to-defeat-maui-gmo-ballot-initiative/
* Proponents of the initiative have spent under $83,000, far less than the $5 million spent by Monsanto alone
Seed companies and their allies have raised nearly $8 million to defeat a Maui County voter initiative that seeks to temporarily ban GMO farming, according to reports filed with the Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission on Monday.
The money raised is along the lines of how much seed companies have been spending to battle GMO-related ballot initiatives across the country, but is unheard-of in Hawaii politics.
“This is historic,” said Tony Baldomero, associate director of the Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission. “This is the highest (amount raised) that I have ever seen since I have been here, by any candidate committee, ballot issue committee, non-candidate committee, even super PAC.”
Maui County’s ballot initiative seeks to impose a temporary moratorium on growing genetically engineered seeds until the county conducts a public health and environmental study of its impact.
The bill is the latest county measure seeking to crack down on Hawaii’s $243 million seed industry, which has been the target of growing activism statewide by residents who are worried about the consequences of pesticides sprayed on genetically modified crops.
According to campaign spending data detailing expenditures from Aug. 10 to Oct. 20 this year, a group called Citizens Against the Maui County Farming Ban has spent more than $6.3 million to defeat the Maui County initiative.
That’s nearly 10 percent of the $64.4 million that all Hawaii political candidates have spent on campaigns according to available data from the Campaign Spending Commission that covers Nov. 8, 2006 to Aug. 9, 2014.
The group still had $1.5 million available as of Oct. 20.
Although the organization bills itself as a citizens group, the vast majority of its money comes from global seed companies Monsanto and DowAgroSciences, which have businesses on Maui and Molokai that would be affected by the measure.
In contrast, supporters of the ballot initiative spent a paltry $82,807.21 — or about 1.3 percent that opponents have spent — and have less than $6,500 left.
Big Biotech Bankrolls the Campaign
Campaign spending records show that Monsanto, the leading global producer of seed crops, has donated more than $5 million to Citizens Against the Maui County Farming Ban.
Monsanto, which brought in more than $14 billion in revenue last year, farms about 3,000 acres in Maui County and employs more than 500 workers.
Dow AgroSciences gave over $1.7 million to the political action committee. The company’s subsidiary, Mycogen Seeds, employs 100 people and farms about 400 acres on Molokai, one of three islands in Maui County.
The rest of the funding came from Washington, D.C.-based Council for Biotechnology Information and another group led by Bennette Misalucha, the executive director for the Hawaii Crop Improvement Association, a trade group for seed companies including Monsanto.
The $7.9 million raised to defeat the Maui County initiative rivals the seed companies’ fundraising efforts in Oregon and Colorado, where residents are set to vote on bills that would require labeling on food products with genetically modified ingredients.
Anti-labeling groups, which have received major donations from seed companies like Monsanto and DuPont Pioneer, have reportedly raised at least $11 million in Colorado and more than $16 million in Oregon.
But the fundraising is historic in Hawaii, where the most any candidate has raised is $6.7 million by Republican gubernatorial candidate Linda Lingle in 2006, Baldomero said.
He couldn’t think of any county or statewide ballot initiatives that have even come close to the Maui County ballot initiative.
The amount of money that Citizens Against the Maui County Farming Ban has raised comes out to more than $90 per registered voter in Maui County, which has a population of just 160,000.
The money raised even exceeds the $4.1 million spent by Pacific Resource Partnership in 2012. The super PAC waged one of the most notorious political campaigns in recent Hawaii history that successfully defeated mayoral candidate Ben Cayetano and helped put Mayor Kirk Caldwell in office.
Carmille Lim, an advocate for open government who leads Common Cause Hawaii, said the high contributions are part of a trend of out-of-state groups and money seeking to influence local elections.
“It’s really concerning when you have outside groups outweighing the voices of the people and changing the dynamic of the issues that affect the specific counties and individual districts,” Lim said.
TV Ads, Mailers, and Signs
Even though the initiative is on Maui, Citizens Against the Maui County Ballot Initiative has been advertising statewide on TV stations, radio stations, and in print.
The group has run a barrage of misleading ads that allege the ballot initiative would shut down all farming operations while increasing pesticide use.
Reports filed with the Federal Communications Commission show that so far, the group has contracts for more than $1.3 million worth of TV spots.
That makes the Maui County initiative among the top 20 most expensive ballot measures in the nation for spending on TV advertising, according to an analysis of statewide ballot initiatives by the Center for Public Integrity.
According to its campaign spending report, Citizens Against the Maui County Ballot Initiative paid $4.2 million to Target Enterprises LLC, a California-based company that manages advertising campaigns.
The group also spent more than half a million dollars sending direct mail, as well as more than $250,000 for research on public opinion. Other notable costs include more than $80,000 in legal fees and $30,730 for printing signs and sign-waving activities.
Over $12,000 was also spent on canvassing, in addition to more than $3,000 for canvassing software. The organization’s spokesman Tom Blackburn-Rodriguez declined to comment on how many people are canvassing and how much they’re getting paid.
John Hart, a communication professor at the Hawaii Pacific University, thinks that the statewide advertising could confuse some voters who may not live on Maui, and lead some to reject a statewide ballot measure that would amend the state constitution to provide more funding for agricultural businesses.
Proponents of that initiative are clearly concerned as well — their most recent mailers state “Not related to the Maui GMO initiative” in large block letters.
“It is a phenomenal amount of money for a county initiative,” Hart said.
So Far Behind
Given how much money is being raised to defeat the Maui County ballot measure, advocates for the bill are overwhelmingly outspent.
So far, they’ve amassed just over $89,000, and used nearly all of it.
The national nonprofit Center for Food Safety’s political action committee received and spent about $15,100, mostly on radio ads and print advertising.
Another $14,000 was raised by a group called Maui United that is run by Autumn Ness, a self-employed resident of Kihei, Maui.
The biggest political action committee supporting the ballot initiative is Maui Citizen’s Initiative for a Temporary Moratorium on GMO Crop Cultivation, which received more than $60,000 and spent more than $55,000 on advertising in TV, print and radio, as well as mailers.
The PAC was started by members of the SHAKA Movement, the organization that successfully gathered more than 9,000 signatures to get the bill on the ballot.
The SHAKA Movement also raised $70,000 through a crowdsourcing campaign called “Help Hawaii End GMO & Openair Chemical Experiments.”
Mark Sheehan, spokesman for SHAKA Movement, said the group did not note that money in its campaign spending disclosure because it was used by the nonprofit for educational activities separate from the Maui County ballot initiative.
Even if the money was included in the report, the group is still woefully behind. The organization hasn’t given up hope — it’s hosting an “ohana body prayer service” this weekend, complete with drummers, juices and crystal magic in return for a $12 “love donation.” But Sheehan is worried that the initiative will fail.
“This is the latest and most dramatic example of how corporations run these islands,” he said.
3. More money, fewer facts: Final week of Oregon’s GMO labeling race
Hannah Wallace
Civil Eats, 28 Oct 2014
http://civileats.com/2014/10/28/more-money-fewer-facts-the-final-week-of-oregons-gmo-labeling-race/
[Excerpt only]
Oregon is awash in GMO labeling cash. Even before the seed giant DuPont Pioneer dumped $4.46 million to oppose mandatory GMO-labeling in Oregon late last week, Ballot Measure 92 had already been on record as the costliest in the state’s history.
As with California’s Proposition 37 and Washington’s Initiative 522 before it, Measure 92 has elicited a steady stream of donations from biotech and Big Food, including companies like Kraft, PepsiCo, CocaCola, and of course, Monsanto, which gave over $4 million against the Oregon measure.
So far, the “No on 92” campaign has brought in over $16 million. The pro-labeling side meanwhile, has raised a nearly $7 million, with several hefty donations from the soap company Dr. Bronner’s and organic food company Pacific Foods and a recent $500,000 donation from meat packing heir Tom Hormel. That brings the total contributions for both sides to $23 million...
4. Exposing the myths of the Anti-Measure 92 letter to physicians
Rick North
The Lund Report, 22 Oct 2014
https://www.thelundreport.org/content/exposing-myths-anti-measure-92-letter-physicians
* As the battle heats up over this multi-million ballot measure, the proponent insists we do have the right to know what’s in our food
Last week, physicians throughout Oregon received a letter from former Oregon Medical Association (OMA) leaders urging recipients to vote against Measure 92, which would require labeling for genetically engineered foods (GMOs). It was paid for by the No on 92 campaign.
In the first paragraph, the letter says “we know that facts matter, and facts should drive public policy.”
Yes, they should. That’s why it’s so unfortunate that this letter is rife with half-truths, misrepresentations, and simply wrong statements.
Let’s take a closer look at some of the sound bites and then go deeper, where the real story can be found:
Letter: “Measure 92 is a complex and costly food labeling scheme that would only exist in Oregon . . .”
The facts: Measure 92 was carefully crafted by a team of food experts and attorneys, including several from the Center for Food Safety, who have argued before the U.S. Supreme Court on genetically engineered food issues. Its hallmark is consistency with current federal labeling laws and efforts in other states.
Connecticut, Maine, and Vermont have already passed GMO labeling bills, although Connecticut and Maine don’t go into effect until neighboring states do. In all, 24 states have introduced similar legislation. Although there can be minor differences state-to-state, the major provisions in Measure 92 are the same as most others.
Costly? The official estimate from the Oregon Secretary of State is that start-up costs for rule-making would be $550,000 - $600,000, a one-time cost of 15 cents for each Oregonian.
Letter: “Measure 92 would create huge new costs and complicated red tape for farmers . . .”
The facts: Out of about 220 agricultural products in Oregon, only four include genetically engineered varieties. The vast majority of Oregon farmers don’t grow GMO crops and wouldn’t be affected at all. For the few that do, all they have to do is inform their processors that their crops are genetically engineered, which costs nothing, or, if they’re selling directly to grocery stores, mark their food containers as genetically engineered, which costs virtually nothing. The initiative also specifically protects farmers from lawsuits for inadvertent GMO contamination. That wheat farmer on TV saying it would cost farmers “millions”? There aren’t any Oregon wheat farmers affected by Measure 92 because genetically engineered wheat has never been approved for commercial sale - it doesn’t exist.
Letter: “Measure 92’s flawed labeling requirements . . . conflict with existing, reliable nationwide standards,” (referring to) “products labeled ‘organic’ or non-GMO.”
The facts: Measure 92 merely supplements national organic and non-GMO labeling with GMO labeling.
Oregon Tilth, the main organic certifying agency; Organically Grown Company, the main organic wholesaler; the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association; the Organic Consumers Association ALL officially endorse Measure 92.
Would they support the initiative if it actually conflicted with national organic standards? Of course not.
Letter: “The American Medical Association states, ‘there is no scientific justification for special labeling of bioengineered foods.’”
The Facts: This quote is actually accurate, although it omits that the AMA “. . . supports mandatory FDA pre-market systemic safety assessments of these (genetically engineered) foods as a preventive measure to ensure the health of the public.” (http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/dining/chi-gmos-should-be-safety-tested-before-they-hit-the-market-says-ama-20120619-story.html). The U.S. is the only developed country that doesn’t have mandatory safety testing. Instead, we have voluntary testing which is solely performed by the same corporations, like Monsanto and Dow Chemical, developing the genetically engineered crops. This is arguably the most serious conflict of interest in our entire food regulatory system.
(Note: Regarding the supposed safety, benefits, etc. of genetically engineered crops, I highly recommend www.gmwatch.org to get the other side of the story – with complete, peer-reviewed scientific citations.)
The letter also omits health organizations that support GMO food labeling: American Public Health Association, American Nurses Association, Union of Concerned Scientists, Physicians for Social Responsibility, and many more. In all, there are 20 health organizations formally endorsing Measure 92 (http://oregonrighttoknow.org/endorsements/). There are zero opposed to it. (OMA had posted on its website that it had no position on the initiative. Marketing and Communications Director Ken Cole said the letter’s authors “don’t reflect the views of the current leadership”.)
I worked 21 years for the American Cancer Society, the last five (1993-1998) as executive vice president of the Oregon chapter. In all our battles with the tobacco companies, I’ll never forget the false and misleading statements they made, especially in TV ads and direct mail. I can say with certainty that the current campaign ads paid for by Monsanto, Dow Chemical, Coke, Pepsi, Kraft, etc. are even more deceptive.
Two final suggestions: Watch the Yes on 92’s 30-second TV ad (http://oregonrighttoknow.org/) featuring Dr. Ray Seidler, former EPA scientist.
Then vote YES on Measure 92. No matter where you stand on health, environmental, religious, and corporate influence questions of genetic engineering, you really do have the right to know what’s in your food.