After the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision opened the floodgates to unlimited corporate money in American elections, the decision’s defenders claimed this wasn’t such a big deal because unions could also take advantage of the decision. A new report by three leading voting rights and judicial independence groups gives the lie to this claim. According to the report, just three corporate interest groups — The Ohio Chamber of Commerce, the Business Council of Alabama, and the Illinois Civil Justice League spent more than 13 times as much trying to influence state supreme court elections as the entire labor movement:

The report focuses on the 2009-10 cycle, so it does not include the recent Wisconsin Supreme Court race where incumbent Justice David Prosser narrowly defeated a progressive challenger after corporate front groups rode to his rescue with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of funds.

Earlier this month, the Senate confirmed Judge Alison Nathan to a federal judgeship in New York. Shockingly, Nathan is only the third openly gay attorney confirmed to a lifetime appointment on the federal bench, and President Obama is only the second president to place an out judge on the bench.

The lion’s share of Nathan’s confirmation process went without serious controversy. Nathan’s nomination cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee by a lopsided 14-4 vote, and, even in this hyperobstructionist Senate, Republicans agreed not to filibuster Nathan’s nomination and allow her to go straight to a confirmation vote. By the week of the vote, Nathan appeared poised to be confirmed in a walk.

Then, the day of her confirmation vote, the Senate GOP suddenly decided that Alison Nathan was a very dangerous woman. She was confirmed — but on an entirely party line vote. As Julie Bolcer reports, this decision came immediately after two anti-gay groups decided to oppose the nomination:

Schumer said he received a “friendly call” from one of his Republican colleagues about 90 minutes before the vote on October 14 to tell him that their conference planned to oppose the nominee uniformly. The senators had received an alert about the nominee from the conservative Heritage Action for America, which scores lawmakers on their votes, and a letter from the Concerned Women for America that took direct aim at Nathan’s sexual orientation.

“Nathan has a long history as political activism with Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender (LGBT) which calls into question her impartiality and judicial temperament,” said the letter, which cited her work as a member of the LGBT policy committee for the Obama campaign in 2008, and her pro-bono representation for groups including the ACLU, Lambda Legal, and Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

So let’s be clear what happened here. Alison Nathan is a brilliant lawyer and former Supreme Court clerk. Half the Republicans on the Judiciary Committee saw no problem with making her a judge. No one in the Republican Caucus objected to giving her an up or down vote on the Senate floor. And then two anti-gay organizations threw tantrum, and the Senate GOP turned on a dime to oppose her.

There was a time in this country when thousands of Native American children were forced from their homes by public and private agencies, then sent to boarding schools where the school founder’s motto was “Kill the Indian, Save the Man.” This practice wiped out cultural ties and traditions from an entire generation on which tribes depended to carry on their legacies. In 1978, Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act, a law meant to ensure that Native American children stay with Native American families, especially when placed in foster care.

But an NPR investigation reveals that 32 states are “failing to abide by the act,” with the most egregious violations occurring in South Dakota. In this state, “Native American children make up only 15 percent of the child population, yet they make up more than half the children in foster care.” According to the investigation, “the state is removing 700 native children a year, sometimes in questionable circumstances,” claiming generic “neglect” when there isn’t any. State records reveal that “almost 90 percent of the kids in family foster care are in non-native homes or group care.”

Meanwhile, these questionable decisions to break up families create a massive inflow of federal money into the state:

Every time a state puts a child in foster care, the federal government sends money. Because South Dakota is poor, it receives even more money than other states – almost a hundred million dollars a year.[...]

Then there’s the bonus money. Take for example something the federal government calls the “adoption incentive bonus.” States receive money if they move kids out of foster care and into adoption — about $4,000 a child. But according to federal records, if the child has “special needs,” a state can get as much as $12,000.

A decade ago, South Dakota designated all Native American children “special needs,” which means Native American children who are permanently removed from their homes are worth more financially to the state than other children.

In 10 years, this adoption bonus program has brought South Dakota almost a million dollars.

As an example, the Children’s Home Society, the state’s largest foster care provider, has close ties to the state. As NPR notes, the foster home used to be run by state Gov. Dennis Daugard who “was on the group’s payroll while he was a lieutenant governor — and while the group received tens of millions of dollars in no-bid state contracts.” Meanwhile, tribal foster homes remain empty.

State officials insist that the money never played a part in the state’s decision to remove a child. “The state doesn’t financially benefit from kids being in care,” said one official. “The state is always paying some part of it.” But as state records show, the federal government reimbursed the state “for almost three quarters of the money it spent on foster care.”

Essentially, the state is removing children under nebulous circumstances and getting a huge pay out in return. As on tribal social worker put it, “they make a living off off our children.”