Democrats & Republicans are stealing funds intended for independent parties to use in the 2024 elections, according to Green Party USA

cross-posted from: lemm.ee/post/36853360

Green Party candidate Jason Call has posted a thread on X. The key points are:

~ The duopoly is going all out to deny third party voices this year

~ The Stein campaign has qualified for Federal Matching Funds, but Congress robbed the fund and Treasury is refusing to pay us $270,000. It is unconscionable and unprecedented….

~ What are Federal Matching Funds? When you file your taxes each year, you’re asked “do you want $3 to go to the Presidential Matching Fund?”

~ It is essentially a fund reserved to help campaigns be more competitive against the flood of big money interests

~ The Jill Stein is the only campaign (other than Mike Pence, no longer active) that has met the threshold for this funding

~ And while the FEC has said we qualify for the match - a payment of $270k at this point - we are being denied that payment

~ Here’s what we are being told: Since the duopoly candidates have rejected that funding for the last 16 years, that $3 per IRS filing grew to over $400 million

~ And this year, Congress decided to “appropriate” those funds for other uses. They took $320mil and gave it to the Secret Service…

~ They took $25mil and gave it to the Justice Dept. They took $55mil for “election security” (ironically securing elections from 3rd parties it seems)

~ Right now we are being denied our earned primary matching funds because there is a “shortfall”

~ What we have earned amounts to 1.5% of what’s in the fund. And they are saying there’s a shortfall? Here’s their reasoning:

~ “We need to wait until the major parties have their convention so we will know if they are going to apply for the funds” Excuse me?

~ Use of matching funds for the general election takes priority over use of funds for the primary, but the only campaigns that can qualify for those funds are the duopoly campaigns

~ The two major parties have not used matching funds for 16 years due to the imposed spending limits

~ But this year, Congress robbed the fund (and if you are a taxpayer and have checked that $3 box, you should be righteously pissed off about this misappropriation)

~ And the Treasury is saying “sorry, we don’t have the money, we might need it for the general”

~ But understand this is a political hit. Congress appropriated that money right when we were messaging that we were about to hit the threshold.

~ The FEC is not the responsible party here. They qualified us, said we were good to go. This is coming from higher up, politically motivated to shut down our traction

~ And it has. It has stifled our momentum. This, and the bullshit lawsuits to keep us off the ballot

~ Democrats say they are defending democracy, but this is how they are doing it. Political trickery and lawfare

~ They are limiting the choices of voters when voters (not BlueMAGA of course, they are cheering on the chicanery) are fed up with the garbage forced on us by the duopoly

~ The Green Party takes no corporate money. We are following the rules. And the playground bullies are continuing to rig the system for the war machine and other corporate interests

~ This is not democracy. It is not justice.