A Sunlight investigation finds that many companies on our Fixed Fortunes 200 list are buttering up party committees on both sides of the aisle with valuable hard money contributions.
Continue readingBipartisan momentum is building for Senate e-filing
While only 22 senators e-filed their campaign donors, some related news reveals a positive trend: More GOPers are stating their support for robust disclosure using the Net.
Continue readingFEC provides one stop downloading for committee spending data
The FEC has made new information available in bulk form, a big step forward for investigators and political reporters looking to go through PAC spending line by line.
Continue readingYour senators’ campaign disclosures are due soon. Will they reveal them instantly online, or push paper?
Your senators have all the technology they need to disclose their campaign donors online. Still, using e-filing technology is voluntary. Whether a senator clicks "upload" or "print" is entirely up to them.
Continue readingSnap Shot Czech Republic: A tale of working Eastern European democracy
Jiří Skuhrovec and the Centre for Applied Economics recently completed a study of the Czech Republic's political system. What did they find? Serious conflicts of interest in the financing of all major Czech parties.
Continue readingOpengov bills still provide hope on Citizens United’s fifth anniversary
To mark Citizens United's fifth anniversary, a number of opengov bills are being introduced to enhance campaign finance data and its disclosure.
Continue readingInside Spending: How Citizens United restored the soft money system
While the Citizens United decision hasn’t necessarily led to more speech about public policy, it has restored the soft money system of politics.
Continue readingCongress just found a way to put more money in politics — can we have more transparency too?
A provision stealthily added to the just-agreed-to congressional spending measure — also known as the omnibus — will allow political parties to raise 10 times more money from wealthy individuals.
Continue readingFixed Fortunes: Biggest corporate political interests spend billions, get trillions
Between 2007-2012, America’s most politically active corporations spent $5.8 billion on federal lobbying and campaign contributions. A Sunlight Foundation analysis suggests, however, that what they gave pales compared to what they got: $4.4 trillion in federal benefits.
Continue readingU.S. Political Finance: Americans spend more on elections, but they lead from behind
Although the U.S. political map turned significantly more red last week, the one unifying color of the midterm elections was green.
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