Obama’s ‘We The People’ initiative bashed as unethical campaigning with taxpayer resources
President Barack Obama’s new “We The People” initiative smells exactly like a political campaign move and is unethical, says one large grassroots conservative group spokesman.
FreedomWorks spokesman Adam Brandon said it appears as though the White House is using official taxpayer-funded government resources to play political games. Brandon told The Daily Caller FreedomWorks is looking into the legality of the new program, too. “The White House [is supposed to be] about policy, not politics,” Brandon said in a telephone interview. “This is a political move.”
The new web campaign is a “direct reaction to the success of the tea party, the left and the Obama administration trying to catch up,” Brandon adds. “I don’t think it’s ethical.”
The Obama administration’s “We The People” initiative opens up the White House website to petition drives. The administration says it will post petitions on the White House website when they get at least 150 signatures. Obama administration social media chief Macon Phillips says if a petition gets 5,000 signatures, “a group of White House policy officials …. will review it, make sure if gets to the right people in the Obama administration, and craft an official response.”
FreedomWorks isn’t the only political group that questions the ethics of the administration’s “We The People” initiative. Republican National Committee spokesperson Kirsten Kukowski told The Daily Caller that the new project reeks of political campaigning almost as much as his recent bus tour.
“The president is clearly in campaign mode from his fundraisers to his campaign bus tour and now more campaign tactics are coming out from the official White House,” Kukowski said. “This shouldn’t come as any surprise to Americans who have come to see him as the ultimate Campaigner-in-Chief.” (RELATED: White House solicits online petitions to shape policy)
Michael Watson contributed reporting for this story.
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