U.S.PIRG

Campaigns

• Support U.S. DOT's Carbon Emissions Rule

  A new proposed rule from the U.S. Department of Transportation (U.S. DOT) considers requiring state and metropolitan transportation organizations to track, measure, and reduce carbon emissions as well as other air pollution from transportation projects. If enacted, this new measure would help increase investment in public transit, expand safe bikeways and pedestrian walkways, relieve traffic congestion, and clean up the air we breathe. But it won't happen without your support. Transportation makes up 31 percent of all U.S. carbon dioxide emissions and is responsible for about 53,000 premature deaths each year. Reducing emissions from transportation will clean up our air and save lives. We need your help to fix the problem. Tell U.S. DOT you support this rule now.

  4,295 of 5,000 Signatures

  Created by US PIRG
• Stop the Tampa Bay Express Lanes

  The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) is planning to spend $3.3 billion taxpayer dollars to add express toll lanes to I-275, I-75 and I-4 in an effort to reduce congestion. But FDOT has acknowledged that the express lanes alone won’t solve congestion and will significantly increase traffic. The surrounding community is also fiercely opposed to the project as it would result in demolishing historic homes, businesses, community centers and parks. At a time when we are strapped for transportation cash, our existing roads and bridges are crumbling and transportation trends are changing, we must reorient transportation funding away from wasteful highway expansions and toward the repair of existing roads and bridges. At the same time, we must make critical investments in other transportation options, such as transit, bicycle and pedestrian projects, to meet Florida's current and future transportation needs. Tell Governor Scott to halt this wasteful highway boondoggle. Add your name.

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  Created by US PIRG
• End Government Subsidies to Wealthy Corporations

  Americans should not have to pay their hard-earned tax dollars to wealthy multinational corporations to conduct business activity abroad. Eliminating the Ex-Im Bank has garnered public support from across the political spectrum, but the largest and most powerful multinational corporations and institutions, such as Boeing and the Chamber of Commerce, have continued to pressure Congress to uphold the subsidies and preserve the status quo. For lawmakers looking to eliminate waste and get our fiscal house in order, the Export-Import Bank should be at the top of the list. With the bank’s charter expiration date set for June 30th, Congress simply needs to do nothing. We need to make sure Congress makes the right choice to let the Export-Import Bank expire, and act in the public interest. (1) http://reut.rs/1umaXLf, http://1.usa.gov/1INucEl

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  Created by U.S. PIRG
• GMO Mushrooms are not worth it

  The U.S. Department of Agriculture just gave the green light to a genetically-modified mushroom that... stays whiter? This is a foolish use of GMO technology, and yet another example of how high-minded GMO rhetoric falls flat in light of more common vanity applications. Now, the product is headed to the FDA for review. As the agency dedicated to protecting citizens from potentially unhealthy or even dangerous products, the FDA has a responsibility to fully test these mushrooms before they go to market. Tell the FDA: This genetically-modified mushroom should not be approved for sale until the health and ecological impacts have been fully tested.

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  Created by US PIRG
• Protect our communities from chemical disasters!

  More than 100 million Americans live in vulnerability zones that surround dangerous chemical facilities, putting them at risk of explosions, fires and releases of toxic chemicals caused by these facilities. We can make our communities safer by ensuring that these facilities switch to safer chemicals and technologies that are both available and affordable. Tell Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy we need a strong rule to make chemical facilities safer!

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  Created by US PIRG
• Tell Experian & T-Mobile to Pay for Security Freezes

  In the wake of a massive data breach of Experian computers affecting 15 million T-Mobile customers and applicants, we urge both companies to: Set a precedent and be the first companies to pay for security freezes on all victims’ credit reports after a data breach. Credit monitoring can only help detect new fraudulent credit accounts after they have been opened or applied for. But security freezes (also called credit freezes) block thieves from opening new accounts in the first place.

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  Created by US PIRG
• Tell Congress: We want protection from toxic chemicals

  For decades, our nation's major chemical law, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), has been too weak to protect us from toxic chemicals in our everyday products. Congress is putting the final touches on an update to the law, but before it hits the President's desk, one big problem needs to be addressed. Chemical industry lobbyists and some lawmakers are pushing hard to preempt efforts by states to protect us from toxic chemicals. States across the country have led the way to protect their citizens from toxic chemicals, and we need to ensure they can continue to safeguard us. Tell Congress to preserve state power in the final bill so states can continue to protect us from toxic chemicals.

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  Created by US PIRG
• Investigate the New York Federal Reserve Over Secret Tapes

  The Federal Reserve Bank of New York is facing accusations that it showed "extreme deference" to Goldman Sachs, a bank it is supposed to oversee. The New York branch of the Federal Reserve system is in charge of regulating the biggest Wall Street banks. However, the Fed has been accused of being too cozy with the banks it is supposed to oversee. For example, during the run-up to the 2008 financial collapse and subsequent $700 billion bailout, the Fed gave trillions of dollars in then-secret aid to banks, firms and even Caterpillar, a tractor company.[1] The latest allegations resulted when a whistleblower - a former examiner at the Fed - gave 46 hours of secret tapes to NPR's "This American Life" and the investigative journalists at ProPublica. The tapes allegedly reveal that the Fed failed to take action on "a deal that the top Fed guy stationed inside Goldman called ‘legal but shady.’"[2] The Fed has denied the whistleblower’s claims. In response to the secret tapes, Senator Elizabeth Warren (MA), who chaired the Congressional investigation into the Wall Street bailout in 2008, has called for oversight hearings. She has been joined by fellow Senate Banking Committee member Sherrod Brown (OH).[3] As Senator Warren said in calling for the hearings: “It’s our job to make sure our financial regulators are doing their jobs.”[4] Please support her call for Congress to investigate the relationship between the New York Fed and banks like Goldman Sachs. [1] https://medium.com/bull-market/secret-goldman-sachs-tapes-latest-in-long-history-of-the-fed-burying-wall-streets-bodies-3c7d3fe5066f [2] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/536/the-secret-recordings-of-carmen-segarra [3] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/28/elizabeth-warren-new-york-fed_n_5896778.html [4] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-26/new-york-fed-denies-allegations-of-bank-supervision-lapse.html

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  Created by Andre Delattre
• Target: Take Real Steps to Address the Data Breach

  Target has been scrambling to respond to the company’s massive data breach, which affected up to 110 million consumers. But so far, they’ve fallen short. Instead of working to make sure data breaches never happen again, they've announced a $5 million "financial education" plan and are offering customers a "ProtectMyID" service that does nothing to prevent fraud on existing accounts and may give consumers a false sense of security. Thieves got away with card numbers, expiration dates and security codes. That's a mother lode for fraud on existing accounts. In fact, JPMorgan Chase has decided to re-issue two million cards that are at risk from the breach. They’re taking this threat seriously. So why isn’t Target? Target needs to do a better job of taking responsibility and protecting consumers from the threat they created. First, they should agree to provide full restitution to all of their consumers who actually become victims of fraud or identity theft as a result of the breach. Second, they should inform consumers that they have a legal right to place a security freeze on their credit reports – that’s the only real way to stop identity theft. And third, they should promptly upgrade their systems to meet the highest industry standards for security.

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  Created by Andre Delattre
• Rein in the Still-Too-Big-To-Fail, Too-Big-To-Manage Big Banks

  Coming out of the Dodd-Frank 2010 overhaul, the goal was to make large banks less of a threat to the economy. One of the requirements was that the largest financial institutions need to submit plans, or living wills, for how the banks would enter bankruptcy in an orderly fashion in case of a crisis. Plans submitted by five of the largest banks have failed testing, which suggests that if there were another crisis today, the government would need to prop up the largest banks if it wanted to avoid financial chaos. In order to prevent that from happening, we need to restore The Glass-Steagall Act, which successfully protected taxpayers and the economy from the risky bets investment banks take. From 1932 to 1999, the original Glass-Steagall Act led to the largest sustained period of economic growth and safe banking in U.S. history; it ensured that investment banks could take risks but consumer deposits in commercial banks were protected. Just seven years after it was largely repealed in 1999, the economy suffered a major collapse and taxpayers were forced to bail out the banks. Now that five big banks have flunked two separate regulator tests of their ability to avoid being bailed out again, it’s time to pass the “21st Century Glass-Steagall Act” to rein in the still too-big-to-fail and still too-big-to-manage big banks.

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  Created by US PIRG