For the candidates, it's all over except for the voting, but for those of us who follow money in politics, it will take months to close the books on what will be the most expensive election in history. Meanwhile, here are a few lessons we learned in the brave new world of unlimited political money:
Continue readingLocal election officials let partisan color$ $how
Thousands of dollars donated by elections officials in Ohio, Florida, and Colorado illustrates an under-appreciated fact of American political life: Election officials are often political partisans who either run for office in the same elections they supervise or owe their jobs to people who do.
Continue readingNo donors to report but $1.5 million to spend for Romney
A political action committee that so far has reported no donations in the current campaign cycle has just unleashed $1.5 million in Internet advertising to help Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
The big web buy, which features a reedy-voiced young girl accusing President Barack Obama of leaving her generation in the lurch, comes courtesy of Right Change, a committee that was active on behalf of a number of Republican House and Senate candidates in 2010 but is only now surfacing in this year's campaign.
According to the group's website, Right Change encompasses a "national movement" of more ...
Continue readingEleven House races drawing 11th-hour outside money
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It doesn't take a whole lot of money to make a big difference in some House races, and as the days dwindle down to hours before polls close on Nov. 6, some outside interest groups are trying to do just that. Sunlight's weekly survey of independent campaign expenditures found that some congressional contests that hadn't previously registered on our radar were suddenly drawing lots of outside cash late in the campaign.
Seven of ...
Continue readingChamber of Commerce funding secret but agenda public
One of the biggest “dark money” spenders in next week’s elections is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. But while the Chamber's funding sources may be murky, its aims -- unlike those of some wealthy super PAC donors -- are relatively transparent.
The 100-year-old nonprofit organization has a far reaching public lobbying agenda that ranges from high profile fights like working to reverse parts of the Affordable Care Act and the Dodd-Frank financial reform law to more obscure issues like keeping flight information about corporate jets secret and opposing tighter regulation of the transportation of highly flammable lithium batteries.
Two ...
Continue readingOutside spenders dump $210 million into last full week of the campaign
In the last full week before the election, outside spending groups have bombarded voters with a record $210 million in ads, direct mail, and other political expenditures, and, as in weeks past, the vast majority of the funds went to support Republican candidates.
Since Sept. 7 -- when the FEC began requiring all groups to disclose independent expenditures, regardless of the content -- the rate of outside spending has ballooned, reaching a new high this week. A Sunlight analysis of Federal Election Commission records shows that organizations dropped $132.6 million to back Republicans in the period between Oct. 26 and Nov. 1, while just $76.4 went to help Democrats. That compares to $26 million for the second week of September.
Continue readingMore guns of October: FSA PAC drops $600,000 in final days of election
Another newly formed super PAC, FSA PAC, or Fair Share Action, is dropping late money, this time on the Democrats’ side. The group reported spending $497,000 to buy an ad supporting Obama on the last day of October and more than $119,000 to support Montana Senator Jon Tester.
According to FSA PAC's FEC filing, the pro-Obama ad is airing in Colorado.
FSA is connected to a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit social welfare organization, the Fair Share Alliance, which is not required to disclose its donors. The latter group's executive director is Brad Martin, a former ...
Continue readingOutside spending group defends Republican outsiders
In the final weeks leading up to Election Day, an outside spending group with ties to two infamous negative campaigns against Democrats has launched efforts to rescue two Republican Party outcasts.
Freedom's Defense Fund is an independent political action committee advocating for limited government with a consultant connected to both the discredited "birther" rumor questioning President Barack Obama's citizenship and the 2004 Swift Boat campaign questioning the Vietnam combat credentials of that year's Democratic presidential candidate, Massachusetts' Sen. John Kerry. Recently, the group poured $312,589 into two states:
- Missouri to support Rep. Todd Akin in his ...
Mystery PAC drops $1.7 million before revealing Adelson connection
A super PAC that deliberately disguised its connection to Republican mega-donor Sheldon Adelson emerged from the shadows to drop nearly $1.7 million in a single day this week to oppose President Barack Obama's reelection, one of a series of money bombs in a week where outside spending threatens to top $200 million.
On the same day it filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission declaring the expenditure, Republicans for Prosperous America also announced it was changing its name to the Republican Jewish Coalition Victory Fund, thereby revealing its ties to the Republican Jewish Coalition, a politically active nonprofit ...
Continue readingConservative columnists’ anti-Obama ads backed by unknown donors
The super PAC run by conservative columnists Michael Reagan and Dick Morris is dropping last-minute money on series of ads against President Barack Obama, and the vast majority of the donors are unknown.
Super PAC for America had only $16,000 in the bank at the end of September. But it’s been infused with cash the second half of this month – and the sources of that bounty will be unknown to the public until December. That's because donations made after Oct. 17 don't have to be reported to the Federal Election Commission until after the election.
Reagan ...
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