National Beverage Lobby Lying to the Public
Thursday, June 17
Beverage lobby is spending millions to mislead voters into signing I-1107 petitions
In contrast to beverage lobby's false claims, Attorney General's Office determined that it is "misleading" to claim that I-1107 is about taxes on food or groceries.
A multi-million dollar signature gathering effort launched last week by the national beverage industry is deliberately mislead voters in order to obtain enough signatures to qualify Initiative 1107 for the November ballot.
Paid signature gatherers brought in from out of state, and a mass statewide mailing this week by the beverage industry, are deceiving potential signers by claiming that I-1107 will repeal a non-existent “food tax” on basic groceries.
“They are engaging in a multi-million dollar effort to deliberately con the public,” said Sandeep Kaushik, the spokesperson for Citizens to Protect Our Economic Future, which opposes I-1107. “The legislature has not introduced a tax on food in Washington. This kind of deception is what happens when out-of-state interests are trying to protect their profits in our state.”
The real intent of I-1107 is to repeal small -- and mostly temporary -- taxes on soda pop, bottled water, candy and gum. Those taxes provide will provide more than $300 million in revenue over the next several years to fund schools, health care and other core services for state residents.
Yet the beverage industry has named their pro-1107 web site StopGroceryTaxes.com.
In a highly disingenuous effort to bolster the false “food tax” claim, the initiative also includes a reversal of an obscure technical correction by the legislature to clarify eligibility about a minor B&O tax exemption for a handful of meat processors.
This effort to claim that the technical fix repealed by I-1107 concerns "food" or "grocery" taxes runs directly counter to the finding of the office of the state Attorney General. When 1107 proponents petitioned a Thurston County Superior Court Judge to insert the same sort of highly misleading ballot language about food and grocery taxes, the Attorney General filed an official court brief that stated that these claims would "mislead voters into thinking that the measures relate to taxes on the groceries they buy. That would be an inaccurate description of the measure... They do not describe a 'tax increase on food,' as the Petitioner would have it." The judge upheld the AG's finding.
“The beverage industry’s inclusion of this technical correction was a deliberate and highly misleading ploy to get the word ‘food’ into the ballot language that will be put before voters if I-1007 collects the necessary 241,000 signatures by July 2. The legislature’s clarification of the 2005 Agrilink court decision has nothing to do with imposing a tax on food and groceries,” Kaushik said.
In addition to the deliberate lies employed by signature gatherers, thousands of people opened their mailboxes this week to find a letter and petition falsely claiming that the state legislature passed a food tax under the noses of voters and asking them to stop the tax hikes on food and beverages (images attached). Initiative 1107 is funded with more than $1.2 million (so far) from the National Beverage Association, a powerful special interest lobby.
“This is a scare tactic aimed at Washington’s families, when in reality it is I-1107 that people should be afraid of,” Kaushik added. If passed I-1107 would strip state funding for health care and education, lead to deep cuts to critical services for seniors and kids. I-1107 would cost hundreds of millions in lost revenue over the next two years, and would lead to further deep cuts to important state services including Basic Health and K-12 education programs.
The ballot title for I-1107 was approved last Thursday. The 1107 campaign has only three weeks to collect 300,000 signatures, forcing them to pay their signature gatherers an extraordinary amount of money per signature. By contrast, the mostly temporary taxes that will protect health care and education are very small—e.g. 2 cents per bottle of water or can of soda.
“The public needs to know the truth about the beverage lobby’s false ‘food tax’ claims before they sign this damaging initiative,” Kaushik said. “Misleading the public is not okay. With only three weeks to collect the more than 300,000 signatures they need to qualify I-1107, it has become clear the beverage industry will do or say anything to get their measure on the ballot.”