Rep. Sean Duffy votes to gut the Cardin-Lugar transparency amendment that required all companies on the New York Stock Exchange to publish payments to foreign governments for natural resource extraction like oil, gas or minerals.

MADISON - We send women and men to Congress to represent our state and our values in Washington. Time and again, Congressman Sean Duffy has failed to represent our state or our values in the nation's capital.

Yesterday, Representative Sean Duffy again voted for Wall Street and big corporations against Wisconsin's Main Streets. In a bold move that flies in the face of hard-working households, Duffy voted to allow oil, gas and other extraction companies to secretly pay foreign governments in which they operate.

House resolution 71, passed yesterday, effectively guts the Cardin-Lugar transparency amendment that required all companies on the New York Stock Exchange to publish payments to foreign governments for natural resource extraction like oil, gas or minerals. This law provided American officials working at home and abroad with the complete inventory of funds to foreign governments coming from American corporations. Furthermore, it helped hold those foreign governments accountable to their citizens.

Sean Duffy's affinity for oil and gas corporations is not surprising as those very same wealthy special interests helped fill his campaign coffers. ExxonMobil PAC has already contributed $13,000 to Sean Duffy's campaigns - an investment that is clearly paying dividends.

"When you look at the big corporations Rep. Sean Duffy has courted it's clear to see that he forgot about the people of Wisconsin long ago. So, it's no surprise that he's put Wall Street corporations ahead of Wisconsin's main street businesses," Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Martha Laning said on Thursday. "Allowing the secret bribing of foreign leaders is not only eyebrow-raising for our foreign policy interests, it's a direct affront to the values of transparency that Wisconsinites demand." ​