Tagged: Beyond November

Jason Rosenbaum is out this week, so we have St. Louis Public Radio's Marshall Griffin filling in. Marshall joins Jo Mannies of the St. Louis Beacon and Chris McDaniel of St. Louis Public Radio to discuss the week in politics.

On this week's show: the special elections bill that's speeding through the statehouse, the early morning voter ID committee and the $6 million plane.

Editor's note: after the recording, the voter ID committee was pushed back to 8 a.m.

St. Louis Mayoral candidate Lewis Reed is accusing Mayor Francis Slay of campaigning at the expense of taxpayers.

Reed, President of the Board of Aldermen, alleges Slay is holding meetings with city employees to campaign for votes while they are on the clock. Glenn Burleigh, Reed’s campaign manager, claims it’s a coordinated effort aimed at multiple departments.

“Telling folks on taxpayer dime: that’s what’s important here," Burleigh said. "These are trash collectors, that instead of picking up trash, were listening to the mayor.”

All of the money given by small donors in the 2012 presidential race was matched by only 32 billionaires and corporations, according to a report released Thursday by MoPIRG, the Missouri Public Interest and Research Group.

It was the first major election since the Supreme Court’s controversial Citizens United decision that allowed an unlimited amount of money to be spent by so-called Super PACs, often without disclosing where the money is coming from.