Millions of Dollars Flow into GMO Labeling and Top-Two Primary Ballot Measure Battles

WWeek:

<img src="http://www.wweek.com/portland/imgs/media.images/19324/kraft_dinner_and_veggie_dogs.t2.jpg"/>

Money is no object in the final weeks of Oregon's ballot measure fights over GMO labeling and a top-two primary. Out-of-state donors are picking up the multimillion-dollar tabs.

On Wednesday, the campaign backing Measure 90—which creates primary elections where the two candidates receiving the most votes advance to the next ballot—reported a $1 million donation from a former Enron executive.

He's John Arnold, a Texas billionaire who made his money from a hedge fund he founded after leaving Enron in 2002. He's been a big contributor to ballot measures intended to cut public pensions.

"Arnold has incurred labor’s wrath by donating millions nationally to roll back the cost of public employee pensions, including $200,000 to help San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed shape a pension initiative for the 2014 or 2016 ballot," The Sacramento Bee reported last year. "Arnold has been vilified as a right-winger and caricatured as a junior version of the Koch brothers."

Arnold's donation comes a day after the campaign opposing Measure 92—which requires labeling foods made using genetically modified organisms—reported donations totaling $1.3 million from food manufacturers PepsiCo and Kraft.

Both food giants have opposed GMO labeling in other states, including Vermont and California, because such labels could reduce consumer desire to buy their products, ranging from Kraft Macaroni & Cheese to Quaker Oatmeal.

Kraft and PepsiCo are also part of a coalition of food manufacturers who have sued Vermont to block the GMO labeling law passed there last year.

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