MAINE PUBLIC • April 14, 2021
Maine lawmakers are considering bills that could sideline Hydro-Quebec from an upcoming referendum on Central Maine Power's highly controversial transmission project. The legislation centers on whether a company wholly owned by the Quebec provincial government should be allowed to spend money to influence Maine voters in the campaign. But the debate is bigger than that, and it has drawn the attention of national groups seeking to beat back the tidal wave of corporate election spending that was unleashed by the U.S. Supreme Court's decade-old Citizens United decision. Steven Hudson, a lobbyist for the Industrial Energy Consumer Group, or IECG, said barring foreign-owned companies, or those with foreign investment, from ballot campaigns would potentially sideline its members. That's because Twin Rivers Paper Co. is Canadian owned. Woodland Pulp is owned by a Chinese firm; so is ND Paper. Sappi Paper is owned by a South African firm.