Caitlin Mac Neal : Sunlight Foundation

Influence Explored: Education Sector Contributes Millions to Presidential Race

by Caitlin Mac Neal Nov 2, 2012 9:25 am

With the Higher Education Opportunity Act up for renewal in 2013, either President Obama or Mitt Romney will need to address higher education, particularly funding and student loans. And although neither campaign has placed much focus on higher education, both candidates touched on the issue during the Presidential debates.

The News Without Transparency: Reports highlight lack of information available on 501(c)4s

by Caitlin Mac Neal Oct 24, 2012 10:54 am

Recent reporting and analysis by ProPublica and the Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group have brought a certain dark money group, the Government Integrity Fund, into the light.

The Government Integrity Fund is registered as a 501(c)4, a type of nonprofit permitted to run issue ads to influence the outcome of elections without disclosing the names its donors to the Federal Election Commission.

Thanks to a long-anticipated ruling by the Federal Communications Commission in August, broadcast stations are now required to make information about political ad buys available online. That FCC decision, along with efforts by the Sunlight Foundation’s Political Ad Sleuth and ProPublica’s Free the Files projects to aggregate the more than 30,000 filings on the FCC database so far, have helped to shed more light on the money these groups are spending and the people and interest groups behind the influence.

Fall cleaning: DC’s Eleanor Holmes Norton deletes tweets

by Caitlin Mac Neal

investigations

Oct 17, 2012 2:00 pm

Holmes Norton tweet

It looks like the office of Eleanor Holmes Norton just discovered that she has been tweeting to the wrong account, typically when publishing personal and partisan reactions in real time.

Politwoops, a Sunlight Foundation tool that aggregates the deleted tweets of politicians, was flooded with deletions from the Washington, D.C. delegate's congressional account this morning. She deleted 17 tweets so far today, some of which were days, even months, old.

While some of the tweets were mere typos, other tweets were not as insignificant. For example, Norton deleted a post that said “Paul Ryan is the affable face ...

Influence Explored: T-Mobile and Metro PCS merge successfully

by Caitlin Mac Neal Oct 10, 2012 2:58 pm

An article in the New York Times last week reported that T-Mobile USA’s parent company, Deutsche Telekom, bought Metro PCS,... View Article