The judicial election in Wisconsin is on April 5 — when Wisconsin voters go to the polls, they won’t know who funded most of the ad spending around it.
Continue readingFeingold’s comeback bid gets major jolt from online donors
Russ Feingold's comeback bid for the Senate earned nearly $1 million from online donors over a six-week period, early reports by online fundraising platform ActBlue show. His online donations led all other congressional candidates and committees over that period.
Continue readingSunshine and shadows: Statehouses tackle open records laws in 2015
The 2016 state legislative sessions have already witnessed a host of important actions, with legislators across the country considering measures to increase and decrease governmental transparency.
Continue readingWisconsin governor scandal shows states as the new front in fight for dark money disclosure
It's still an open question whether the allegations brought against Scott Walker will end his career, but they could signal the beginning of the end to loopholes that wealthy donors use to keep their names out the public eye.
Continue readingSunlight and secrecy in the Upper Midwest
On campaign finance as in other areas of policy, the formerly similar states of Minnesota and Wisconsin are on two different paths. This Upper Midwestern divergence is a microcosmic example of campaign finance politics in the country as a whole.
Continue readingAd spotlight: GOP family feud
The rift in the Republican party is turning into an air war.
Usually, video attacks are reserved for election opponents or members of the opposite party but as members of Congress returned home for their August recess, members of the GOP appear to be gleefully violating the late President Ronald Reagan's "11th commandment" -- the one that said you shoul never speak ill of a fellow Republican. What we've spotted so far:
Freedomworks is going after John Cornyn, the No. 2 Republican leader in the Senate leadership. The Tea Party-affiliated think tank is accusing the Texas Republican of betraying ...
Continue readingAbortion restrictions going viral?
As state lawmakers in Texas and North Carolina move towards enacting tough new limits on abortions, Sunlight decided to use some of our data tools to see how far the trend is spreading nationwide. To do so, we lifted key phrases from four of the most restrictive abortion bills that have either been enacted or considered recently and ran those terms through our Open States database, which surveys activity in all 50 state legislatures.
Restrictive abortion bills on the move in 2013
Spending in Wisconsin spikes before debate
As Rep. Tammy Baldwin and former Gov. Tommy Thompson prepare for the first of three debates tonight in a race that will help determine control of the Senate, their campaigns and outside groups are bombarding Wisconsin with advertising to sway the hearts and minds of undecided voters.
An analysis of expenditures and political ad buys shows an increase in expenditures by campaigns and outside groups heading into the last month of the long, politically charged year. Since April, Wisconsin has garnered national attention from its Republican presidential primary, another primary to determine who would run against Gov. Scott Walker in ...
Sunlight Weekly Roundup: “anytime you have an entity that receives state dollars, there should be transparency”
Following the Penn State child sexual abuse scandal, lawmakers want to strip state-related institutions’ exemption from Pennsylvania’s right-to-know law. State... View Article
Continue readingUsing Opengovernment.org to understand your constituencies
In continuing with our series on OpenGovernment.org, this time we take a look at how you can learn more about... View Article
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