Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) has launched an online petition on moveon.org that he hopes to deliver to his own body, as in Senate, as well as the House and the President.
Franken wants to amend the Constitution to overturn the Citizens United decision. The Supreme Court ruling allows corporations and unions to fund electioneering ads in the run-up to federal elections and said that the ban on such funding violated their speech rights.
Franken was a big backer of another legislative attempt to repair what he saw as the damage done by the ruling. That was the DISCLOSE Act, an unsuccessful attempt to require enhanced disclosures of the funding of Super PACS, including identifying those backers in on-air political ads.
"We, the undersigned, have had it. Corporations are not people. Elections should not be auctions, and we refuse to let our democracy be put up for sale," the petition reads. "We are standing together to call for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United."
At press time, the petition had more than 80,000 signatures, with Franken saying his target was 100,000.
