Just 53 political corporations spent a whopping $41,622,820.18 in just one week in their effort to directly influence the outcome of the 2010 congressional races. The $41.6 million in independent expenditures by these corporations during the week of October 3-9, 2010 approximately doubles the $21.2 million spent on independent expenditures in the congressional campaigns the [...]

Since the Citizens United Supreme Court decision this spring, front groups representing the interests of corporations and wealthy Americans have been able to spend unlimited amounts in “independent expenditures” to influence congressional elections. As the 2010 election draws closer, more and more of that money is being spent. The contributors to these front groups are [...]

According to the latest available public opinion poll, Republican David Vitter is 18 points ahead of conservative Democrat Charlie Melancon in the Louisiana Senate race, and with Melancon’s fundraising at half of Vitter’s he doesn’t seem liable to catch up. So why, according to the latest reports by the FEC, is the American College of [...]

With the advent of unlimited independent expenditures in the Spring of 2010, corporate political groups have been unleashed to influence congressional elections as they and their undisclosed individual contributors see fit. But although individual contributors to these corporate groups remain shrouded, the activity of the corporate groups themselves is tracked on a daily basis by [...]

Who does Patrick Tiberi represent? Nominally, Pat Tiberi is the representative of the 12th District of Ohio. But you know the old saying: them who pay the piper call the tune. For his race for re-election against Paula Brooks, Tiberi has raised 55.1% from sources outside the state of Ohio, most of that money from [...]

The pharmaceutical corporation Abbott Laboratories is not fond of Mary Jo Kilroy. In her first term in Congress, Rep. Kilroy has pushed against “Pay to Delay,” the practice in which big drug manufacturers pay off generic suppliers to keep inexpensive medicine off the market. She also cosponsored H.R. 684, a bill that would have saved [...]

The Supreme Court may have given corporations the green light to spend unlimited amounts on congressional campaigns, but that doesn’t mean candidates must accept the money. Alexi Giannoulias, the winner of yesterday’s Illinois Democratic Party nomination for U.S. Senate, declares on the front page of his website that: Alexi’s campaign doesn’t take money from the [...]

Look at when the dozens and dozens of corporate managers and executives in the South Carolina-based SCANA corporation independently decided, all on their own, to send campaign contributions to North Carolina Senator Richard Burr: All the “independent” contributions come in April and May of 2009, with none before and none after from SCANA employees for [...]

Tim Rupli is a registered lobbyist for a variety of non-profit and for-profit corporations including the anti-immigration Numbers USA, the payday-lenders’ association called the Community Financial Services Association of America, the Independent Community Bankers of America, MetaBank, the Network Branded Prepaid Card Association, weapons training corporation Lasershot Inc., and pharmaceutical corporation Sepracor. In compensation for [...]

Apparently, pharmacists dominated personal contributions to Arkansas Representative Marion Berry’s campaign with simultaneous bundling associated with at least one PAC. These contributions came while Marion Berry was shepherding legislation through Congress of financial benefit to pharmacists. Democratic Radio Address by Rep. Marion Berry, March 2006: Today’s seniors helped this country through the Depression, fought two [...]