There are 38 days left before the elections. Whether you are rejoicing the over a month left of punditry or silently cursing the five more weeks of what feels like the longest election cycle ever, we have a series of webinars to get you prepared for Election Day (when that day finally arrives).

While much of the national focus on the presidential race, there are 453 congressional races also up for election this fall, too. Join us on Tuesday, Oct. 2 to learn how to follow the money in your congressional contest from finding the latest campaign finance totals to up-to-the-minute reports filed by super PACs and other outside groups.

The five week webinar series also provides a new training every week on topics such as how to uncover the spending behind political ads from TV stations, get data from political fundraisers, research political ads and a special edition cram session to prep you for Election Day.

All the webinars will be archived, but be sure to sign up so we can save you a virtual seat.

In the three months before congressional leaders announced that they are once again opening the process to suspend tariffs, at least 71 private companies have already lobbied to get their own exemption and nine more have registered. Each one has a product they’d like to import a little more cheaply. So far this year, the companies report lobbying expenditures of $14 million on issues including this one – but if history is any guide, it may be well worth the expense.

The last time Congress passed a miscellaneous tariff bill (MTB), in 2010, it cost taxpayers $298 million in lost revenue over three years, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Members have until tonight to send in provisions they want included in this year’s legislation, according to House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont.

In short, the MTB is legislation written for corporations, by corporations to save them money on products they import and use in manufacturing. The companies solicit members of Congress to introduce bills reducing their tariffs and those bills eventually get rolled into the MTB, a long green eyeshade document that few members of Congress likely will take the time to read. Call it “nearmarking.” With earmarks now banned, critics say the tariff bill offers members of Congress an alternate route to get special favors for pet concerns at taxpayer expenses. Republican Sens. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., and Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., have introduced legislation would send all tariff requests directly to the International Trade Commission (ITC), cutting Congress out of the process.

“There is no good reason why businesses go to members of Congress and not directly to the International Trade Commission with their petitions,” said DeMint spokesman Wesley Denton.

But guess who’s pushing the tariff bill? Sixty freshman Republican lawmakers –who generally have been among the loudest voices against special dealing and for deficit reduction -- recently wrote to House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., urging favorable treatment of the MTB. They argued that it’s a bill that will spur American jobs.

Lobbying

Congress considers tariff legislation almost every two years. And while heavy corporate lobbying on it is typical, it's hard to compare historic spending trends because lobbying records weren't digitized until 2008 and congressional lobbying records didn't begin tracking lobbying specifically on the miscellaneous tariff bill until the last few years.

Lobbying disclosure information reported to the Senate Office of Public Records.

But the number of tariff suspensions enacted by Congress appears to be on the upswing. In 2004, Congress passed an MTB with 433 tariff suspensions. Two years later, the MTB that passed two years later suspended duties on 280 products and generated a tariff savings of about $660 million for corporations according to a study conducted by Capital Trade, Incorporated, an economic consulting firm that focuses on international trade. But later that year, Congress approved a second bill suspending duties on another 580 products. During the 111th Congress, which ran from 2009 through 2010, lobbying records on file with the Senate show 192 companies with $385 million in lobbying expenses on tariff issues. Of that amount, $205 million was spent in the final six months before passage of H.R. 4380, the United States Manufacturing Enhancement Act of 2010. The bill included duty suspensions on 665 products, benefiting 113 corporations, according to data provided by the House Ways and Means committee.

An examination of the 2010 bill and lobbying records related to the MTB provides vivid examples of how members of Congress use the tariff legislation to do favors for home-state businesses.

Bayer

Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., submitted 28 requests to suspend duties on products for Bayer. All but three made it into law. Overall, Bayer got a remarkable 62 duty suspensions from 15 members of Congress, making the German drug manufacturer the top beneficiary of the bill. Mary Petrovic, Rep. Cleaver's press secretary, defended the support, noting that Bayer employs a number of people in his home district in Missouri.

Bayer and its subsidiaries spent $8.3 million lobbying the bill and other issues in 2009 and 2010 according to records disclosed with the Senate. The corporation has reported spending $7.2 lobbying the issue and others this session so far.

Cleaver also received $5,500 in campaign contributions from employees of Bayer and their family members during the 2007-2008 and the 2009-2010 election cycles. So far this cycle he’s received $2,000 from people associated with Bayer, according to InfluenceExplorer.com.

Michelin

An examination of lobbying records disclosed in 2010 showed that the tire manufacturer Michelin lobbied on 21 bills introduced by Senator Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., to reimburse duties they paid on tire products. Michelin, which operates a number of plants in Graham’s state, reported spending at least $1.1 million on issues including tariffs and was the only company that reported lobbying on the 21 original bills dealing with tariff reimbursements that Graham introduced. The provisions Michelin wanted made it into the final bill.

Tracking which corporations benefit from provisions that originated on the Senate side is harder than the House side, because the Senate traditionally has not revealed which members requested each provision. It’s not clear whether the Senate will adopt the House transparency process this time around. That potentially could shed more light on relationships between senators and the corporations they help through this bill.

Dan Ikenson, an expert in trade issues at the Cato Institute, favors reducing all tariffs unilaterally. But he called the MTB a good thing even though it only temporarily suspends duties on a limited number of products. He described the measure as “gradual progress” towards creating more competition in the markets.

Ikenson, however, doesn’t agree with all of the rules that go into writing the MTB. Only allowing import products to be considered if they are not produced in the United States is bad for competition., he said. Magnesium, for instance, is only produced by one company in the United States and therefore has little incentive to make prices competitive, Ikenson said. He argued that lifting duties on imported magnesium would allow U.S. manufacturers to get better prices.

“We’re picking winners and losers in our markets by placing duties on certain items,” Ikenson said.

While masses of people are flocking to liquor stores to play today's record setting Mega Millions lottery, those behind the games benefit from much shorter odds in the political game, using influence to ensure big payoffs.

Take Gtech, a gaming technology giant based in Providence, R.I., that has contracts with 16 of the states that participate in Mega Millions to provide lottery terminals and other services. The company, its PAC, employees and their family members have given $4.1 million in campaign contributions to state and federal-level candidates and party committees dating back to 1991. It's spent $3.4 million lobbying the federal government since 1997, according to the Sunlight Foundation's Influence Explorer.

Gtech has also been a revolving door destination for state lottery officials. In 1999, in a lengthy profile of the company, the Washington Monthly reported,

Three directors of the New York state lottery have gone to work for the company as lobbyists or consultants, as have numerous directors from other states. After a conflict over Massachusetts' lottery, director James Hosker, a close friend of Gtech's, took the job managing Kentucky's lottery and secured a sweet deal for the company in that state. Where did Hosker move next? A lucrative job on the Gtech payroll.

In a 2007 article, the Journal News in Lower Hudson Valley, N.Y., detailed numerous other incidents in Gtech's past, including:

- Hiring the former patronage chief for then-New York Gov. Mario Cuomo as a $20,000-a-month consultant. Tonio Burgos held the job for about three months until the deal leaked out. - Awarding a former gubernatorial aide in Missouri a 10-year, $80,000-a-year consulting contract after GTECH won that state's business. - Hiring lobbyists in Texas who included two former aides to then-Gov. George W. Bush, as well as former Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes. In 1996, public pressure led to Barnes' contract being bought out for $23 million.

An Italian firm, Lottomatica S.p.A., acquired Gtech in August 2006. According to its most recent annual report, Gtech had $1.3 billion in revenues, was active in 51 countries, and provided its services to 26 of the 41 online lottery authorities in the United States.

Lottery suppliers like Gtech aren't the gambling interests making sure bets on politics: casinos and other gaming companies have contributed more than $557 million to federal and state candidates and political committees since 1989, according to data in Influence Explorer.

While journalistic skill and technique are essential for writing a good investigative article, we often take it for granted that journalists have access to the information they need to write complex news stories. Without publicly available data, much of our news would not be possible. We've been looking at investigative articles as part of an ongoing series called "Back to the Source" for the last several months. Now we've decided to amp it up a bit and make redacted visuals to explicitly demonstrate how little the public would know without laws and regulations that force the government to make the data it has publicly available.

In honor of Sunshine Week we decided to create "The News Without Transparency." We took original investigative articles and manually blacked out all the information that would not be known without existing transparency measures. It is worth taking a look at just how little we would know.

Some examples we found notable are below, and the ongoing series is available here.

The News Without Transparency: Military Defense Contractors, Lobbyists Support Mrs. McKeon

The News Without Transparency: Pentagon Contractors Flock to Mrs. McKeon

Military defense contractors and lobbyists are rushing to support the wife of Congressional House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon in her bid for California state assembly, according to a Salon article in early February. This article would not have been possible without public access to campaign finance and lobbying data. The article reports that in the first few months of fundraising, Patricia McKeon was able to collect $19,200 from defense contractors or their lobbyists. This includes $3,000 from Lockheed Martin - a company currently locked in a battle to maintain funding for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jet. It also includes donations from lobbying firm Beau Boulter LLC, which lobbies on behalf of Proxy Aviations, and Bruce Leftwich, a DC-based government affairs specialist. The California Secretary of State's website provides campaign finance data for all candidates running for public office, including Patricia McKeon's. The data can be searched by contributions received or made, expenditures made, late and high dollar contributions, and late independent expenditures. The contributions listed on Mrs. McKeon's disclosure page include the following... Click here to read the full text of our analysis.

The News Without Transparency: U.S. Approved Business With Blacklisted Nations

The News Without Transparency: U.S. Approves Business With Blacklisted Nations

The New York Times published an article in December 2010 investigating the U.S. government’s approval of American companies doing business with countries blacklisted for sponsoring terrorism, such as Iran. According to the article, the Treasury Department has granted almost 10,000 licenses for business deals involving these blacklisted nations, some of which were impacted by political influence. In addition to good reporting, the public availability of data was essential to making this such a meaningful investigative piece. That said, much of the underlying data for this article was hard to obtain, and the article itself says that even after the Times filed a FOIA request, “The process took three years, and the government heavily redacted many documents. . . ” We investigated and have highlighted what data is publicly available and what data isn’t, but in some cases can be obtained through FOIA. The article highlights how much less business the United States did with Iran than China or Europe did, pointing out that “…in the first quarter of this year, 0.02 percent of American exports went to Iran.” The U.S. Census Bureau provides monthly and annual datasets detailing American foreign trade, which provides information such as the data point used in the article. The annual report for 2010 is available here and can be viewed as a PDF or as a zip file for text or excel formats. Click here to read our full analysis of the data behind this article

The News Without Transparency: Obama Rewards Campaign Contributors

The News Without Transparency: Obama Rewards Campaign Contributors

An in-depth analysis of Obama's 2008 campaign contributors conducted by iWatch News in 2011 determined that in certain circumstances major bundlers ended up receiving appointments to key White House positions, invitations to White House events, and stimulus money awarded through contracts. This analysis required a high level of investigative journalism skill, but would not have been possible without public access to several data sources. The iWatch analysis frequently returns to the story of Donald H. Gips, a Colorado businessman and bundler for Obama. His story provides a useful frame for illustrating the data sources that provided essential information for this piece. The article states that Gips bundled over $500,000 for Obama in 2008.  Presidential candidates are not required to report their bundlers, but both Obama and McCain chose to do so in 2008. The Center for Responsive Politics makes available the list from 2008 as well as a list of 2012 bundlers for those candidates who have chosen to disclose. While the candidate usually only discloses the name of the bundler, CRP adds value by including additional information such as the total amount contributed, the name of the bundler, the city and state, and employer. The information also contains the total amount the bundler has contributed him or herself to the specified candidate since 1990. Bundlers are additionally broken down by industry. A search for Gips shows that he bundled over $500,000 in 2008 and has individually donated $32,391 since 1990. Click here to read the full text of our analysis.

The News Without Transparency: $52 Steaks on Menu as AT&T Feted Lawmakers During T-Mobile Push

The News Without Transparency: $52 Steaks on Menu as AT&T Feted Lawmakers During T-Mobile Push

The proposed AT&T/T-Mobile merger dominated the news in Washington last fall. It caused quite the stir, with numerous outlets reporting on AT&T's massive lobbying efforts to push through the merger. Bloomberg was one such news outlet, reporting a story of expensive steaks and 'lobbyist's libations' in early September. The story focused on the numerous swanky fundraisers AT&T was hosting as well as their generous campaign donations to key lawmakers. This was a detailed investigative piece that involved a good deal of skilled journalism. It would not have been possible without public access to campaign finance data and lobbying disclosure information. The article begins describing the lavish fundraisers AT&T had been hosting for lawmakers, citing Sunlight's Party Time data. Sunlight's Party Time data is free and available for anyone to use. We manually collect fundraiser and event invitations and put them online. They are searchable by a variety of of criteria including committee, leadership PAC, beneficiary, host, and venue. Click here to read the full text of our analysis.

One of the questions we frequently hear in this brave new world of super PACs and the seven-figure donations made to these independent organizations is, simply, why is this a problem? Thanks to super PACs, after all, candidates like Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich can say in the race far longer than they could have in the past, giving voters a wider choice. A Mitt Romney, meanwhile, has super PAC supporters who can attack them both. Super PACs are contributing to political speech, the thinking goes, to a robust democratic process where primary voters who go to the polls in March, April--perhaps as late as June--will have a say in who their party's nominee is.

The problem, simply put, is that the donors to these organizations are not disinterested promoters of politics, but rather, individuals with numerous issues before local, state and federal governments, and the means to influence those who will be in charge of resolving those issues. Political giving is how they accomplish their ends.

A lobbyist for Waste Control Specialists, a company owned by mega-donor Harold C. Simmons, explained to an Albuquerque Journal reporter in 1999 why the Texas billionaire had given to New Mexico politicians: "We didn't want to be strangers when we showed up with a request," he said.

The request involved state tax breaks and incentives to lure a nuclear enrichment facility to the southeast corner of New Mexico--one move in a 17-year long struggle Simmons and a company he controls undertook to win approval for a low level radioactive waste dump in Andrews, Texas, just across the border from the site of the proposed uranium plant. The latter effort is still ongoing but has ultimately been successful--after the Simmons combine contributed more than $1.13 million to Texas legislative races, $1.68 million to gubernatorial candidates and $264,500 to Texas political parties.

Overall, Simmons, his wife, two of his daughters and the companies he controls have contributed at least $34.8 million to parties, political action committees, politicians and other political organizations, including super PACs like American Crossroads and 527s like Swift Boat Vets & POWs for Truth.

To arrive at that number, we started with data from InfluenceExplorer.com, which has federal campaign data from the Center for Responsive Politics and state level contributions for the National Institute on Money in State Politics. We added 527 contributions reported to the Internal Revenue Service (you can look them up here or download them in bulk from the Center for Responsive Politics), records of contributions to Texas political action committees from the Texas Ethics Commission, and searches of other state databases of PAC contributions where Simmons had contributed to state level candidates, including California and Virginia.

We searched for giving by Simmons, his wife, two of his adult daughters who've listed his companies or family foundation as their employers and direct contributions from his companies, which include Contran, Valhi, NL Industries, Titanium Metals, Southwest Louisiana Land and Waste Control Specialists. We included relevant giving by Amalgamated Sugar during the years in which Simmons owned that firm. We also looked at lobbying records--federal ones in InfluenceExplorer.com, and state records from the Texas Ethics Commission. We also looked for contributions by the employees and PACs of those companies, but totaled that figure separately: they gave about $2.8 million. The earliest federal contributions are from 1989 and run through 2011;  the earliest state level contributions are from 1993.

Simmons's activities have generated a great deal of attention in Texas, especially his efforts with Waste Control Specialists to secure permits to dump massive amounts of low level radioactive waste there. Media accounts were incredibly helpful, and there has been great reporting on the issue in the Lone Star State from the Dallas Morning News, the Austin-American Statesman, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, the Houston Chronicle, the Texas Observer and the Texas Tribune. A lot of these accounts are available online, but many--especially the older stories--were accessed through Lexis-Nexis.

Because radioactive waste disposal is a highly regulated endeavor, there is a great deal of public information about Waste Control Specialists' activities in Texas, ranging from license applications to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to a website the company itself launched as part of its public relations effort. But most government decisions are not made with so much public input and disclosure of documents. While Simmons has left a long paper trail, both of publicly reported campaign contributions and public filings with regulatory agents, many big donors find alternate routes to influence the legislative process without leaving nearly so public a footprint. Tracing their activities, in an era of organizations that influence politics without disclosing donors, is the real challenge, and something that we'll look at in future stealthy wealthy posts.

Last month Politico reported that corporate contributions to a super PAC set up to support Democratic U.S. Rep. Howard Berman were being used as a weapon against him during the contentious primary race that he and Democratic Rep. Brad Sherman, also from California, have found themselves in as a result of redistricting.

The Politico article is able to report facts regarding campaign finance data by accessing publicly available information. The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 initially established substantive disclosure requirements for federal candidates, political parties, and PACs. Subsequent amendments and legislation, including the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 and the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007 have further strengthened these requirements.

As I have written about before, this information can be found on the Federal Election Commission’s website under Campaign Finance Reports and Data, but  it’s not easy to use unless you know what you are looking for. However, because the information is made available to the public, organizations like the Sunlight Foundation, ProPublica and the New York Times have been able to take FEC data and put it in more user-friendly formats. The information is then presented so that the most relevant information is easily accessible to regular people.

---

"The News Without Transparency" shows you what the news would look like without public access to information. Laws and regulations that force the government to make the data it has publicly available are absolutely vital, along with services that take that raw data and make it easy for reporters to write sentences like the ones we've redacted in the piece above. If you have an article you'd like us to put through the redaction machine, please send us an email at mbuck@sunlightfoundation.com.

It’s probably not necessary to remind you what semi-national holiday is today. From heart shaped donuts at the Krispy Kreme to special couples’ menu at the restaurants to the plethora of sweets and candied hearts in the office, today is indeed National Heart Health Day! Okay, maybe that was two weeks ago (National Wear Red Day) and all those sweets would probably be terrible for your heart. I won’t sugar coat it anymore (*wince) but it is indeed Valentine’s Day. A day dedicated to the celebration of your loved one(s) and to supporting the flowers/confectionery/greeting card industry.

But in the midst of all that love, can you spare some for Sunlight?

Sure we aren’t your significant other, or even casually dating, but we have been there for you when you needed us most…

Remember that time you thought your ‘loved’ one was cheating on you and found all that weird campaign finance and lobbying spending on Influence Explorer?

Or when you weren’t sure if you were ready to commit because of all the stuff you were reading in the news media? We helped you run a Poligraft on that.

And whenever there was a break in your social calendar, we helped you fill it up with the hottest parties in town with Party Time. Speaking of which, did you make it to the V-Day breakfast this morning?

And when your friend Kevin was freaking you out by putting together a compilation of scary political ads about China, you were able to look at the influence for yourself with the Foreign Lobbying Influence Tracker.

And lastly, when you were sick of being nagged to ‘take out the trash - we got you the proof of every time you have been told to do it in Capitol Words (apparently only a handful of times, so stop being so sensitive!)

They say a functional relationship is one where there is a healthy give and take… and after all that we have given you, we only ask for one thing. Scientific research shows that people are more prone to respond positively to favors and request if presented in poetry, so here we go:

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

Do you love Sunlight?

Vote for us for a Shorty Award!

We even made it easy for you, just click here:  Tweet #opengov

Watch out Buddy Roemer, we are coming for you, even if your #superPACvalentine is pretty awesome. Voting closes on the 17th, so please tweet your vote today!

Totally non-transparency/opengov related Valentine’s Day fun: http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/2012/02/13/afp-valentines-slideshow/

Military defense contractors and lobbyists are rushing to support the wife of Congressional House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon in her bid for California state assembly, according to a Salon article earlier this month. The article reports that in the first few months of fundraising, Patricia McKeon was able to collect $19,200 from defense contractors or their lobbyists. This includes $3,000 from Lockheed Martin - a company currently locked in a battle to maintain funding for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jet.  It also includes donations from lobbying firm Beau Boulter LLC, which lobbies on behalf of Proxy Aviations, and Bruce Leftwich, a DC-based government affairs specialist. The California Secretary of State's website provides campaign finance data for all candidates running for public office, including Patricia McKeon's. The data can be searched by contributions received or made, expenditures made, late and high dollar contributions, and late independent expenditures. The contributions listed on Mrs. McKeon's disclosure page include:

• $3,000 given to Mrs. McKeon's campaign on Oct. 28, 2011 from Bethesda-based Lockheed Martin.
• $1,500 given to the campaign by the Arlington, VA lobby shop Beau Boulter on Dec. 29, 2011. The Center for Responsive Politics' lobbying firm look up tool shows that in 2011 Beau Boulter LLC earned over $1.5 million from lobbying on behalf of several companies from the sea and air transport and defense industries.
• $500 donated to Mrs. McKeon on Nov. 15, 2011 from DC lobbyist Bruce Leftwich. A search using Sunlight's Influence Explorer indicates that in 2011-2012 Leftwich lobbied on veterans affairs and education issues along with the federal budget and appropriations. He also donated $2,000 to Mrs. McKeon's husband, Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA), in 2007-2008.
• The campaign finance data provided by the Secretary of State does not indicate the industry associated with the donations (where applicable), so the $19,200 from the defense industry reported by Salon was likely the result of manual research into the names of employers on Mrs. McKeon's donation list. The National Institute on Money in State Politics and the Center for Responsive Politics both provide research tools that associate individuals and corporations with an industry.

The article also reports that Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA) has been the number one beneficiary of military industry campaign donations for 49 years. A search using Sunlight's Influence Explorer shows the following:

• The top industries supporting Rep. McKeon financially across all years include Defense Aerospace, Misc Defense, Defense Electronics, Lobbyists, and General Contractors.
• Rep. McKeon was the number one beneficiary of the Defense Aerospace industry in 2011-2012.
• He was also the number one recipient for campaign contributions from Beau Boulter LLC in 2011-2012. The other top beneficiaries of the lobby shop during the 2011-2012 election cycle were also all Republican members of the House Armed Services Committee.

There are almost 27,000 people—or 1/100th of one percent of the United States population—who spent more than $10,000 to influence elections during the 2010 election cycle.

The top 10 people from this elite class of donors together spent more than $23 million on the last election. The majority of that money went to Super PACs used for independent expenditures. Eight contributed their money exclusively to Republican groups and candidates; two contributed exclusively to Democratic groups and candidates.

In total, this tiny group of relatively unknown individuals was responsible for $774 million of the $3.2 billion that poured into the hotly contested mid-term elections. That money went not only to candidate campaigns and political action committees, but to Super PACs, officially known as “independent expenditure-only committees.” After the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Citizens United and the Federal Election Commission’s two advisory opinions that followed, individuals and corporations effectively have unlimited giving potential. By giving to Super PACs, they can bypass traditional giving limits.

The group that benefited most from the top 10 mega-donors largesse: American Crossroads. That Super PAC received millions of dollars from seven of the top donors, and $7 million from just one donor, Bob Perry.

Here’s a look at who’s who among America’s top 10 most influential givers:

1. Bob Perry is the CEO of Perry Homes. Perry has been influential in politics and a prominent donor for a number of years. In 2004, he gave $8 million to a number of nonprofit political groups known as 527 committees. Most notably, $4.4 million of that money went to the political group Swift Vets and POWs for Truth, which opposed Sen. John Kerry’s presidential bid. During the 2010 election cycle, Perry donated $7.3 million to political efforts. All but a small portion of his money for the 2010 election went to American Crossroads, a group cofounded by former George W. Bush strategist Karl Rove and former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie.

2. Wayne Hughes, owner and chairman of Public Storage, Inc. According to disclosures, Hughes gave a total of $3.28 million to conservative candidates and committees, with $3.25 million going to American Crossroads. Hughes also gave $4,800 to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va.

3. Fred Eshelman is the CEO of Pharmaceutical Product Development. Eshelman spent $3 million in 2010 funding his own group, RightChange. RightChange registered with the FEC as a Super PAC and spent those millions of dollars to defeat Democratic candidates including Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado and Sen. Patty Murray of Washington.

4. Robert Rowling, CEO and Chairman of TRT Holdings, a holding company that owns Golds Gyms and Omni Hotels as well as oil and gas interests. Rowling spent $2.59 million during the last election on conservative efforts. He gave $2.5 million of that money to American Crossroads.

5. Donald Sussman is the Chairman of the holding company Paloma Partners. Sussman, who earlier this year married Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, gave $1.26 million in 2010 to Democratic candidates. He has also funded a group called the Democracy Fund, a separate but predecessor organization to the United Republic Action Fund. Both of these groups have been affiliated with United Republic, and both have been dissolved.* Sussman gave a little more than $750,000 to the Super PAC Women Vote! and its parent organization Emily’s List. Those two organizations support pro-choice female political candidates.

6. John Ricketts is the founder of TD Ameritrade and still a board member there. In 2010, his total political contributions were $1.25 million. He gave to a variety of Republican candidates, including House Speaker John Boehner.

7. Jerry Perenchio is the CEO of the investment firm Chartwell Partners and former owner of the Spanish-speaking television network Univision. In 2010, he gave $1.12 million to conservative candidates and groups, including $1 million to American Crossroads.

8. Trevor Rees-Jones is the president of Chief Oil & Gas. In 2010, he gave $1.1 million to Republican efforts. $1,000,000 of that was given to American Crossroads.

9. Rachel Hunter is the Treasurer for the organization Media Matters and an heir to the Hyatt Hotels fortune. She’s related to Penny Pritzker who was the national finance chairwoman of the Obama campaign in 2008. In 2010, Hunter gave more than $1 million to democratic groups and candidates. The bulk of that money went to the 527 organization, Bring Ohio Back.

10. John Childs is on the Board of Directors for Club for Growth and is the founder of JW Childs Assoc., a private equity firm. In 2010, he gave a total $923,000 to Super PACs supporting Republicans and to Republican candidates directly. He gave $100,000 of that money to American Crossroads and $650,000 to his own group, Club for Growth.

For a full list of the top donors for 2010, see the embedded spreadsheet below.

Also, as a disclaimer, we think it is important to note that there are funders of the Sunlight Foundation on this list. For example, David Bonderman and Marjorie Roswell are numbers 9 and 103 on the list and have donated to the Sunlight Foundation. Additionally, the founder of the Open Society Foundations, George Soros, is 134th on the list. Open Society Foundations has provided grant support to Sunlight.

*Based on inaccurate information received from a source at United Republic, we originally reported incorrectly that Donald Sussman is a funder of that organization.

Last week I blogged on the Influence Around Us and took a look at the amount of money spent by the groups and businesses on campaign contributions and lobbying right in our neighborhood.

We heard lots of positive feedback and interest from our readers who wanted to explore the influence of money in politics around them. So, to help sweeten the sleuthing, we are launching a photo contest! Take your own photo or screenshot from street view on Google Maps and tag it with data from Influence Explorer using Thinglink. We will send you a prize for your participation and if your photo is worth more than our intersection, you will win a grand prize! Send your Thinglinked photos to info@sunlightfoundation.com or post a link to your picture to our Facebook wall to enter!