What are Un-PAC's mission and vision?
Mission:
Vision:
Who runs Un-PAC?
What is the Youth Power Summer Academy and how can I apply?
Starting in mid-June 2022, students will learn about the history of campaign finance, voting rights, lobbying, and how lobbying by special interests and wealthy corporations blocks action on the issues we care about. Education and training are crucial for preparing young people to become advocates of change and learning history can help young people feel part of the larger legacy of activism and social change. Participants in our program will study past social movements and, in turn, gain the valuable, transferrable, lifelong organizing skills they’ll need to fight to realize the promise of American democracy.
- Students are expected to attend nine online training sessions over the course of the summer and complete assignments that will prepare them to become successful political organizers.
Upon graduation, student participants will be transitioned into roles as Un-PAC Student Organizers and become the leading force behind pro-democracy campaigns on their college campuses. Youth organizing is not just about mobilizing young people to turn out for a specific issue; it’s about building them up as leaders, providing them with the skills, resources, and infrastructures to continue the work wherever they go.
- As Un-PAC Student Organizers, students are expected to work 10 hours per week and complete goals that will help them build student organizing infrastructure at their school and mobilize their peers for their respective campaigns.
Both the Youth Power Summer Academy and the Un-PAC Student Organizer role pay $15/hr.
What is Un-PAC’s current campaign?
Universities often leverage their financial and institutional power to influence politics, legislation, candidates and organizations. Students have long been kept out of the decision making process of how our tuition dollars are spent in politics. Given that our tuition dollars are used to build a university’s political influence, our institutions have a responsibility to use that influence to safeguard our freedom to vote, enhance youth voter participation, and ensure that state and federal legislators act in the best interests of young people. Without greater transparency, our universities will continue to be complicit in a broken system that allows big money to determine policy outcomes instead of what young people need. Our generation has the most to lose in this fight and we have the numbers and power to put effective pressure on our university administrators to advocate for our futures.
We are targeting our universities with the following demands:
- Campaign Finance Reform:
- Full transparency on the university’s lobbying and political spending endeavors, including within trade associations.
- No campaign contributions to candidates or legislators who are anti-voter (have voted or indicated support for overturning election results, deny the legitimacy of the 2020 election, or support anti-voter policies that create barriers to voting).
- Cut ties with corporations who are funding anti-voter candidates or elected officials:
- No investments in these corporations
- No physical presence of these corporations on campuses or contracts with these corporations
- No recruiting of students by these corporations
Voting:
- Requiring voter registration at freshman orientation
- No class on Election Day so students have the time and capacity to vote
- Administrations should petition the state legislature t to get a polling location on campus, ideally for both early voting and on Election Day
What was H.R.1/S.1, the For The People Act?
Clean and fair elections
- Improve Access – H.R. 1 will create automatic and same-day voter registration across the country; re-enfranchise former felons; expand early voting and simplify absentee voting; and modernize the U.S. voting system.
- Restores the Voting Rights Act
- Ends Gerrymandering – H.R.1 will prevent politicians from picking their voters
- Promote Integrity – H.R. 1 prohibits voter roll purges
- Ensure Security – H.R. 1 enhances federal support for voting system security, especially paper ballots, increasing oversight over election vendors, and developing a national strategy to protect democratic institutions.
End the dominance of big money in our politics
- Guarantee Disclosure – H.R. 1 shines a light on dark money in politics by upgrading online political ad disclosure and requiring all organizations involved in political activity to disclose their large donors. H.R. 1 also breaks the so-called ‘nesting-doll’ sham that allows big-money contributors and special interests to hide the true funding source of their political spending.
- Empower Citizens – H.R. 1 gives political power to everyday Americans, creating a multiple matching system for small donations, thereby allowing the American people to exercise their due influence in our politics. This will break special interests’ stranglehold on Congress and lay the groundwork for an agenda that serves the American people. H.R. 1 also pushes back on the Citizens United and Buckley decisions by the Supreme Court.
- Strengthen Oversight – H.R. 1 tightens rules on super PACs and restructures the FEC to break the gridlock and enhance its enforcement mechanisms. It also repeals Mitch McConnell’s riders that prevent government agencies from requiring common sense disclosure of political spending.
Ensure public officials work for the public interest
- Fortify Ethics Law – H.R. 1 expands conflict of interest law and divestment requirements, slowing the revolving door, preventing Members of Congress from serving on corporate boards and requiring presidents to disclose their tax returns.
- Impose Greater Ethics Enforcement – H.R. 1 overhauls the Office of Government Ethics, closing loopholes for lobbyists and foreign agents, ensuring watchdogs have sufficient resources to enforce the law and creating a code of ethics for the Supreme Court.
Where does my money go?
Un-PAC Action is a federal 501(c)4 (a political nonprofit) that funds youth organizing efforts working to increase awareness and provide pressure on elected leaders to support American democracy reform.
Is my donation secure?
Any and all sensitive information is tokenized and transmitted over encrypted tunnels. We use the same system trusted by organizations like Robinhood, Acorns, Betterment, Wealthfront, AmericanExpress, and Venmo. We’ve got you covered.
Do you charge any fees?
Is my contribution tax deductible?
Who can donate to Un-PAC?
How else can I support Un-PAC?
Share the campaign on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, email and text your friends, and tell your neighbors! Use the hashtag #UnPAC when you share on social media.