Health security

Senate leaders: Whose “dark money” is funding vaccine opponents?

Two groups lobbying against stricter requirements on childhood vaccinations are using “dark money” while refusing to follow state transparency rules by not registering with ethics officials, Democratic leaders of the state Senate charged Thursday.

Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney of New Haven, Majority Leader Bob Duff of Norwalk and Sen. Mary Daugherty Abrams, co-chairman of the legislative Public Health Committee, said the groups are engaged in organized fundraising and seem to have spent beyond the $3,000 thresholds for registering as lobbyists with the Office of State Ethics.

The anti-vaccination groups Informed Choice Connecticut and Health Choice 4 Action remain secret operations with no public scrutiny, the senators said.

A third group, the Connecticut Freedom Alliance, based in Ridgefield, registered with the ethics office this week, but did not indicate a lobbying budget.

The groups have attracted thousands of supporters to the Capitol this session, have social media sites and websites, have rented roadside billboard ads and have created stickers and posters.

“Transparency is critical to an honest and effective public policy process,” Looney said in a written statement Thursday. “We know foreign governments are fueling public dissent in America on health care. We know that out-of-state people are trying to influence Connecticut's discourse on public health. The public deserves to know who is funding these groups that are actively lobbying legislators to endanger the health of our children.”