After campaign finance scandals earned our state the nickname “Corrupticut,” Common Cause in Connecticut spearheaded passage of the Citizens’ Election Program, magnifying the power of small dollar donors and allowing people of modest means to seek and win public office. In 2021 we helped pass legislation allowing CEP funds to be used for childcare costs – a commonsense reform of the program that will make it more likely that parents of young children will be able to run for office.

We continue to defend the program against the efforts of big money interests to remove it from the state budget.

Since we helped establish it in 2005, the Citizens’ Election Program (CEP) has helped ensure more competitive elections and a more diverse and representative legislature in Hartford. When the Connecticut General Assembly passed the Citizens’ Election Program, it invited aspiring candidates to run for office without being beholden to special interests. Anyone seeking statewide office may apply for a grant of public funds after raising sufficient qualifying contributions. The Citizens’ Election Program has more than proved its worth, and the vast majority of candidates for State Representative, State Senate, and Constitutional office now run “clean.”

• Read the report: Amplifying Small-Dollar Donors in the Citizens United Era
• Download our flyer on the Citizens’ Election Program.
• Read an OpEd in the Hartford Courant regarding the need to protect the Citizens’ Election Program.
• Read the letter from 22 public interest organizations (including Common Cause in Connecticut) to Gov. Dannel Malloy on the need to preserve the CEP, sent in September, 2017.
• Read our September, 2017 news release calling on Gov. Malloy to veto the budget bill to protect the CEP.
• Read more about the CEP on the Connecticut State Elections Enforcement Commission’s web page.