How is money raised in political campaigns?

Comparison of campaign money raised and spent between Democrats and Republicans

• A conservative friend of mine claims that during the 2004 comapaign the Democrats raised more money than the Republicans, and that much of their contributions came from large corporations, whereas, most of the money raised by Republicans came from small businesses. This strikes me as backwards. What are the official results of money contributed to both parties, and is it possible to identify the sources? Also, who is responsible for compiling this data and making it available to the public?

• Answer:

  Hello, As of Dec. 14, the Democratic Party had raised $710 million in the 2003-04 election cycle. The GOP had raised $863 million. Source: Center for Responsive Politics, "Political Parties," http://www.opensecrets.org/parties/index.asp. The parties themselves must compile records of contributions and send them to the Federal Elections Commission. Source: FEC, "The FEC and the Federal Campaign Finance Law," Feb. 2004, http://www.fec.gov/pages/brochures/fecfeca.shtml. Reports must include the names and addresses of contributors. See, for example, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's latest filing at (http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/dcdev/forms/C00000935/155728/sa/ALL). Contributions from corporations themselves are illegal. People can only donate to federal candidates as individuals or through political-action committees. Therefore, your friend cannot be exactly right. Companies used to be able to contribute "soft money" to political parties. If we look at the top soft-money contributors in the 2002 election cycle, we see that the biggest companies on the list contributed more to Republicans than to Democrats. Freddie Mac, AT&T, Philip Morris, Microsoft, Fannie Mae, Anheuser-Busch, Archer Daniels Midland, Verizon, Citigroup, SBC Communications, Pfizer, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Bristol-Myers Squibb and AFLAC all favored the GOP. Only Goldman Sachs and Viacom preferred the Democrats. The Democrats did, however, get a lot of money from law firms, labor unions and smaller media companies. Source: CRP, "Top Soft Money Donors: 2002 Election Cycle," http://www.opensecrets.org/softmoney/softtop.asp?txtCycle=2002&txtSort=amnt. I hope this answer meets your needs. If not, please request clarification. Search strategy: No searching was necessary for this answer, as I was already familiar with the sites. However, a search on "federal campaign financing" provides good results.