PROBLEM STATEMENTS:

(a) All 95 counties in the State of Tennessee must be audited to address the lack of equity across the state, especially in rural and urban communities. As the next potential Governor of the State of Tennessee, my particular interest will be the poorest counties in Tennessee, especially farmers and rural residents.

(b) The neglect and intentional underfunding of rural and urban communities have created a domino effect to force crime, drug activities, and gang affiliations into rural Tennessee because of the gross gentrification in traditional underserved and marginalized communities. Budgets are moral documents, and every politician must be accountable to the people, including the Governor of the State of Tennessee.

(c) Political corruption has been out of control in the State of Tennessee for decades, where billions of dollars are going to rich developers, rich investors, and special interest groups while working-class Tennesseans are economically suffering. It is time for an unbossed and unbought Governor to stand up for the people. I have a proven history of standing up, and I am ready for the task of placing people back into politics! Politicians should not be bullies, but protectors of our democracy.

(d) Political corruption is the abuse of public office for private gain, including bribery, extortion, cronyism, and embezzlement. It erodes public trust, distorts democratic processes, and directs resources toward elites, undermining economic development and public services. Key types include "grand corruption" by senior officials and "petty corruption" by lower-level bureaucrats.

(e) Political corruption is the use of power by government officials or their network contacts for illegitimate private gain. Forms of corruption vary but can include bribery, lobbying, extortion, cronyism, nepotism, parochialism, patronage, influence peddling, graft, and embezzlement. Corruption may facilitate criminal enterprise, such as drug trafficking, money laundering, and human trafficking, although it is not restricted to these activities.

(f) Some forms of corruption, now called "institutional corruption", are distinguished from bribery and other kinds of obvious personal gain. For example, certain state institutions may consistently act against the interests of the public, such as by misusing public funds for their own interest, or by engaging in illegal or immoral behavior with impunity. Bribery and overt criminal acts by individuals may not necessarily be evident, but the institution nonetheless acts immorally as a whole. The mafia state phenomenon is an example of institutional corruption.

(g) Lobbying, a major and most well-known component of government relations, on the other hand, consists of "directly advocating for or against particular legislation or regulations”. As there are laws regulating lobbying, there are often loopholes in these frameworks. The Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA) has several loopholes and weaknesses that allow lobbying influences to occur with limited transparency.

ATWATER'S PLAN OF ACTION - FORENSIC AUDITS OF ALL 95 COUNTIES

In the first 90 days of my administration, I would inspect, dissect, and analyze layers of abuse against the citizens and taxpayers of the State of Tennessee. 

First priority: To implement a Tennessee Code Orange Accountability Task Force (TCOATF) which would be a third-party operational task force to perform an initial forensic investigation into political and judicial corruption, review term limits and qualified immunity as it relates to police officers, political and judicial actors, research all judicial complaints made by Tennesseans, investigate abusive tax incentives to large corporations, seek legal interruptions on discriminatory bills such as HB 1895, SB 2153, HB 0978, HB 2143, HB 2657, SB 2012, and SB 2683, all bills regarding abusive and insidious attacks on civil rights, voting rights, women’s reproductive health care rights, immigrants, restore social equity and justice in the LGBTQ community, perform an analysis of local, state and federal funds allocation across the 95 counties.

Other areas of interest will be the violations of the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA), bias governmental contracts, misappropriation of PPP distribution funds, CARES Act distribution funding, abuse of Medicaid expenditures, analysis of federal funding and no-bid contracts, rural financial disparities, housing genocide on the poor, Tax incentives and PILOTs for large corporations, Medicaid mismanagement, misappropriation and/or mishandling of TANF (Tennessee Assistance for Needy Families), misuse of low-income children’s security number and identification, Tennessee DHS abuse, CoreCivic abuse and mismanaged governmental agreements, school vouch inequities and privatization of prison system. Investigate the gross violations of land trust guidelines and financial abuse against Tennessee State University, thus releasing $2.2 billion to the university with interest. Perform a comprehensive financial disparity study as it relates to TSU and UT-Knoxville, which are both land-grant colleges.

Second priority: To implement a “Medicaid for All” Plan to ensure that all Tennesseans receive an affordable, quality healthcare regimen, which should be a human right in the State of Tennessee. I would aggressively address the pharmaceutical abuse in the State of Tennessee, which causes many citizens to choose between buying their medication and skipping a meal or two.

Third priority: To repeal the Right to Work Law and remove it from our Tennessee Constitution. I would incorporate a State of Tennessee Livable Wage Plan to entail a $18.50 – $21.50 incremental minimum wage and incorporate a Teacher’s Loyalty Plan.

Fourth priority: As the next potential Governor of the State of Tennessee, I would pass a bill banning corporate spending in Tennessee politics. This is exactly the kind of gallant reform Tennesseans need to restore trust in our democracy and political process. Our elections should belong to the people and not lobbyists, corporations, and special interests.

For too long, massive corporate money has drowned out the voices of everyday voters. As the next potential Governor, I will show Tennesseans what real democracy reform looks like: putting people first, protecting the integrity of elections, and making clear that political power should never be for sale.

The bill will restrict certain political spending activities by corporations and other “artificial persons” under Tennessee law by redefining and limiting the powers granted to those entities. Political action committees will remain governed by existing campaign finance laws within the state, but they will not be able to spend any money received from corporations as a result of this bill.

Legality: The bill prohibits "covered business entities," defined as those providing limited liability to owners or managers, from engaging in "election activity" or "campaign finance activity". Under this bill, a business entity found in violation would be subject to involuntary dissolution or dissociation. Furthermore, the bill strips the entity of its limited liability protection, subjecting its owners, shareholders, members, and managers to personal liability for the entity's actions as if they were general partners.

This bill will intend to strengthen transparency, reduce the influence of corporate money in elections and help restore public trust in Tennessee’s democratic process.

(1) First, the bill will begin with the premise that corporations lack rights and exercise only those privileges granted by statute.  Specifically, it declares that “artificial persons,” including corporations (both for-profit and nonprofit), limited liability companies, partnerships, and associations, have only those powers conferred upon them by statute.  State corporate law traditionally grants corporations the same powers afforded to individuals and authorizes them to “do all things necessary or convenient to carry out its business and affairs,”  including the power “to make payments or donations, or do any other act, not inconsistent with law, that furthers the business and affairs of the corporation.”  The new law will vitiate these broad protections by asserting that “artificial persons created under Tennessee law possess only those powers that are necessary or convenient to carry out lawful business and charitable or organizational purposes, and that those powers do not include the power to spend money or contribute anything of value to influence elections or ballot measures” (emphasis added).  Thus, the new law will redefine the scope of corporate power for all organizations that are not Hawaii or federal candidate committees or non-candidate political committees. 

Second, the day the law goes into effect, it strips each Tennessee entity of the powers it held the day before. The new law asserts that “the creation and continued existence of a corporation is not a right but a conditional grant of legal status by the State and remains subject to complete withdrawal at any time.  All powers previously granted to corporations under the laws of this State are revoked in their entirety.  A corporation operating under the jurisdiction of this State shall possess no power unless specifically granted by this section.”  In short, a Tennessee corporation’s power and authority to act are entirely subject to the whim of the current state government.

Tennessee-based candidate and noncandidate political committees, and similar committees organized under federal law, would be exempted from the new law and retain the ability to engage in political activity, but politically active Section 501(c) organizations will not be.  The law may specifically address candidate committees and PACs from other states, but appears to apply to such entities.

Third, following the full revocation of every entity’s powers, the bill re-grants those powers, but withholds the power to engage in “acts that constitute election activities or ballot-issue activities.”  Engaging in election activities or ballot-issue activities will be forbidden if the law goes into effect.  “Election activity” is defined to mean “paying, contributing, or expending money or anything of value to support or oppose a candidate, political party, or political committee.”  “Ballot-issue activity” means “paying, contributing, or expending money or anything of value to support or oppose a constitutional amendment, county charter amendment, or other ballot question after it has been formally certified or submitted to the electors of the State or any county.”  Both terms include exceptions for media companies.

Fourth, the new law would impose severe penalties on corporations and other organizations that exercise their political speech rights. The statute proclaims that “any act undertaken by a corporation that constitutes an election activity or ballot-issue activity is ultra vires beyond the powers and void,” and the penalty will be the loss of corporate status “as a matter of law.”  The statute references a yet-to-be-developed procedure for “administrative forfeiture, reinstatement upon disgorgement and certification of compliance, and related civil enforcement.”  In other words, any Hawaii corporation or other organization that spends money on election activity or ballot-issue activity automatically loses its legal status and faces an administrative enforcement process.

Fifth, the law subjects any corporation or other organization based in another state that transacts business or holds property in Tennessee to the same political speech restrictions applicable to domestic corporations.  Specifically, “a foreign corporation that directly or indirectly undertakes, finances, or directs election activity or ballot-issue activity in Tennessee shall be conclusively deemed to be transacting business in Tennessee.”  To ensure that out-of-state organizations cannot spend on Hawaii elections and ballot issues, the term “transacting business” is defined to include engaging in election activities or ballot-issue activities in Tennessee.  The application of this requirement has multiple parts.  Under the new law, if an out-of-state entity spends funds to support a Tennessee candidate, that out-of-state entity would be “transacting business” in Tennessee.  To transact business in Tennessee, though, the entity must first register as a foreign corporation (or other foreign entity type).  Upon spending on election activity or ballot initiative activity, the foreign entity would lose its foreign registration status and no longer be able to transact business in Tennessee, and presumably would become subject to an administrative enforcement process.

The new law will include corresponding provisions that implement the same changes for credit unions, for-profit corporations, nonprofit corporations, professional corporations, cooperative associations, limited-equity housing cooperatives, limited liability partnerships, limited partnerships, limited liability companies, and unincorporated nonprofit associations.

Every Democrat, Republican, Independent, Socialist, Libertarian, and Green Party member should be fighting to get corporate money out of politics to place people back into politics. No more manipulating. No more control. No more excuses. No more corruption. Give the power back to the people.