Tell Obama to Reject Duke Energy Loan

Just days before the Japanese earthquake, nuclear power company Duke Energy extended a $10 million loan to Obama’s re-election convention committee.

President Obama accepting a line of credit from Duke Energy — a company that operates three nuclear plants and is negotiating with federal officials on subsidies to build a fourth — while formulating his response to the crisis in Japan and reviewing our own energy policy presents the potential for a disheartening and disastrous conflict of interests.

Furthermore, accepting this loan would seriously undermine the administration’s efforts to clean up electoral politics, which have included the Democratic National Convention banning direct corporate contributions for the first time ever.

Please, join us in urging Obama to reject corporate loans to his re-election committee.

Subject:

Your Letter:

Dear President Obama,

I thank you for the support you have provided to Japan at this time of unfathomable crisis.

However, I am deeply concerned that your administration continues to profess its commitment to use taxpayer money to build new nuclear reactors — even as the Japanese contend with the ongoing threat of significant radioactivity and U.S. reactor and spent fuel storage vulnerabilities have come in to question.

I also find it inappropriate that during this time of crisis, when we are reviewing and rethinking our nuclear policy, you are accepting support from nuclear power interests.

I urge you to reject the $10 million line of credit provided to your re-election convention committee by nuclear power company Duke Energy.

Accepting the line of credit offered by Duke Energy gives the perception of a conflict of interest in the formulation of your response to the nuclear crisis in Japan and undermines your administration’s recent efforts to clean up convention financing.

The new convention funding reforms posed by your administration are an important rebuke to the corporate dominance of politics that has soared since the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

Please, reject the line of credit offered by Duke Energy in order to preserve incremental gains to neutralize corporate control over the people’s democracy and limit the perception that corporate interests are informing your stance on nuclear power.

Sincerely,

President Barack Obama

Phone:(202) 456-1111

Fax:(202) 456-2461