In front of a small crowd of supporters and Syracuse University students, congressional candidate Steve Williams said the United States is becoming an oligarchy — more controlled by a small group of wealthy elites.

On Wednesday night, the SU chapter of Democracy Matters, a national student group that focuses on campaign finance reform, invited Williams to discuss his thoughts on the issue. Williams is running for the 24th Congressional District as one of three Democrats looking to challenge Republican incumbent John Katko (R-Syracuse). The other two Democratic candidates are Colleen Deacon, an SU alumna and former congressional aide to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), and Eric Kingson, a professor of social work at SU.

Williams gave an overview of the landmark campaign finance court case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Committee, and encouraged the audience to fight to repeal the decision.

Seth Porter, a member of Democracy Matters and a senior political science and television, radio and film dual major at SU, introduced Williams. Porter is working on Williams’ campaign.

The candidate began by addressing the issue of low voter turnout, especially among young voters. He continued to say that the votes of most college-age people often do not have as much influence as the votes of people like the Koch brothers.

The Citizens United case allowed corporations to continue to pump nearly endless amounts of money into advertising for political candidates, Williams said. This money flows through super PACs, which are not required to disclose their supporters.

“This has created a very, very bad environment in our country,” Williams said.

While Williams was discussing the case, one of the audience members abruptly left the room with a video camera. Williams said the woman was a “political tracker” who had been paid by the Republican Party to record what Williams says on the campaign trail. Williams said after the event that he had seen the woman before.

After continuing the discussion on campaign finance, Williams said the concentration of power among the wealthy has allowed them to make policies that hurt the middle class. He said free trade agreements are one of these policies.

Williams has said he plans to fight free trade agreements and the outsourcing of jobs to foreign countries.

He also addressed raising the minimum wage — a proposal he said he supports.

“Does it make sense that people in this country can work full time and still be impoverished?” Williams said.

Toward the end of his speech, Williams said students must continue to keep on top of issues. While their lives may become much busier, he said it is important that they stay involved in and informed about government.

He mentioned a recent incident when someone came into a restaurant Williams was in and said he supported Donald Trump “because he had balls.”

Williams left after fielding questions from the audience about tax reform, student debt and climate change.

Jessica Faunce, the president of Democracy Matters at SU and a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences, said Williams was the first politician the group invited to campus. She said the organization’s events are usually issue-based, and added that having a candidate in the middle of the campaign process connected to the group’s purpose.

“Since we are non-partisan, we really emphasize that (the event) has to be strictly about campaign finance and then can be opened up to students’ interests,” Faunce said.

The group is not endorsing Williams or any other candidate, she said.

Published on March 10, 2016 at 12:19 am

Contact Delaney: dovanwey@syr.edu