Transcript

Forum: Corporate Political Spending and Foreign Influence

Hosted by Commissioner Ellen L. Weintraub

Federal Election Commission, 999 E St. NW, Washington, DC 20463

June 23, 2016

Statement of Sheila Krumholz, Center for Responsive Politics

SHEILA KRUMHOLZ, CENTER FOR RESPONSIVE POLITICS: Thank you. Thanks to the FEC and 

Commissioner Weintraub and all of you for your interest.

I am flying without PowerPoint so there will be no death by PowerPoint but there might be death by 

data, so we'll try to keep it lively and I'm sure the speakers who follow me will give us a reason for hope 

and a rousing sendoff.

I am going to provide some context for the rest of the day’s discussion with an overview of the 

money in 2016 along with some comparative figures from the previous presidential election cycle and 

an update on who the top players are now. 

First at the macro level. The Center for Responsive Politics tallied $6.32 billion spent on the 2012 

election cycle at the federal level, based on reported spending. So, again, $6.3 billion. That doesn't 

include at least $100 million or so spent on federal electioneering that didn't fall within the reporting 

windows. So we might want to round that to $6.4 billion. By comparison, the total raised thus far in the

current cycle is only $3.35 billion, including some data only through March and other data for outside 

spending that is based on spending as of yesterday. So it's not uniform. Of the $3.35 billion, $1.8 billion 

has been spent on the presidential races and about 1.34 has been raised for congressional. 
Outside money makes up 1/5 of the money raised for presidential races and a majority of 

presidential money goes to Republican and conservative organizations. 56% on the congressional side, 

that's similar, about 53% conservative or Republican. 

So, what will the 2016 elections cost? Some are already calling this a $10 billion election, which 

would be quite a leap from 6.3, 6.4 billion in 2012. Even if we went with the higher amount of what was 

reported having been raised in 2012, that would only be $6.7 billion. 

Another way to compare it is to take all the money raised so far this year, $3.35 billion and 

compare it to a relatively comparable period in 2012. So the money raised through September 2012 

totals only $4.7 billion compared, again, to 3.35. This isn't, there isn't enough data yet to extrapolate, so 

it's really pure conjecture at this point, but if I had to guess, I'd say we're more likely to see a grand total 

of 7 or 8 billion rather than 10. 

That said, all it takes is one or two billionaires to upset the apple cart and these comparisons go 

out the window. Since the Citizens United decision, outside money has grown and become increasingly 

important in funding elections. It now exceeds $400 million in this cycle and is close to three times as 

high in the current cycle as it was at this point in 2012. 16%, it is 16% of the grand total raised, higher 

than all previous cycles. Not surprisingly, super PACs are what’s driving this spending with about $341 

million in independent expenditures so far, accounting for 84% of all outside spending, roughly the same 

share as at this point as in the last presidential cycle. 

Dark money refers to money from undisclosed donors spent by either political, nonprofit, that 

does not disclose its donors or a super PAC taking contributions from a political nonprofit or a shell 

corporation. The biggest dark money spender this cycle is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce; the biggest 

liberal dark money spender is votevets.org. There's been about $37 million in reported dark money 

spending, over 15 million in dark money spending in the 2016 presidential race so far. As with outside 
spending, it makes up a larger percent now than in previous cycles: it’s running nearly 3 times as high as 

in 2012, so 13.8%, sorry, 13.8 million versus 37 million in this current cycle. 

So given that dark money spending exceeded $300 million in 2012, 500 or $600 million is 

definitely within the realm of possibility this cycle. In fact, speculating, we could see GOP donors dump a 

lot of outside and possibly dark money in to help Trump make up for his shortfall if he can't raise money 

conventionally, so it could go much higher. On the other hand, relatively few people spend the money, 

leading to more randomness and less ability to predict with any precision. 

Also, there are dark money groups that aren't even captured in the data like One Nation, which 

at this point has spent at least $15 million in Senate races without reporting anything to the FEC. These 

groups are most active in Senate races and other races at the state level. 

It’s also important to note that single candidate non-profits have been growing in popularity in 

the last few cycles. They don't generally start spending until mid- to late summer. Their money is more 

effective in House and Senate races where they'll probably spend most this cycle. 

Turning now to corporate and LLC donors. If you go to the opensecrets.org home page and 

select “Top Corporate and LLC Donors This Cycle” under the “Megadonors” banner, you'll see that 

corporations and LLCs have delivered just shy of $200 million to super PACs going back to 2011. Today, 

however, they're giving at a faster clip. While most outside money comes from individuals, the $22 

million given so far by LLCs at this point in 2012 is less than 1/3 of what's already been given so far this 

cycle. Stay tuned for an update to this downloadable data possibly in the next day or two. Contact CRP 

researcher Alex Baumgart, who created and maintains this data for an update. Again, this data’s 

downloadable and maintained. 
Top corporate and LLC donors are heavily conservative, with the number one corporate donor 

so far this cycle is a subsidiary of Star Companies, backed by Hank Greenberg, giving more than $12.5 

million to conservative presidential super PACs, though Greenberg gave at least 15 million in total 

through his companies. The top LLC donor so far this cycle is Bessie Lou Stables with a $3.5 million gift to 

Conservative Solutions PAC. I don’t think corporate PACs are a focus really for this discussion but I’ll 

point out that senior researcher Douglas Webber has quite a bit of research on corporate PACs that he 

can share if you contact him.

I'll just give you a couple highlights. The corporate PACs have been a steady source of 

contributions over time and have increased their contributions substantially in the 21st century. 

Adjusting for inflation, corporate PAC contributions increased by 80% between 2000 and 2014. 

Corporate PACs prefer Republicans and whoever controls Congress. In cycles where Democrats control 

Congress, contributions are relatively even between the parties; when Republicans control Congress, the 

corporate PACs heavily favor Republicans. Through March 31st, corporate PACs were running ahead of 

previous cycles and they still exceed corporate contributions to outside money groups. 

In terms of tracking foreign money, the center doesn’t have much analysis to offer because at this point 

it takes investigative reporting by journalists working their sources and FEC enforcement. We can easily 

identify the American divisions of foreign companies that form PACs and collect contributions from their 

American employees. We have an indication of the foreign connected interest behind these PACs on our 

site based on the headquarters of their parent company. So far this cycle, foreign-sponsored corporate 

PACs have contributed nearly $10 million, 2/3 of that to Republican candidates. The much greater 

concern, of course, is money given through organizations by organizations directly and allowed to keep 

their donors hidden. Undisclosed donors means we can’t know if the donors to a politically active 

nonprofit are foreign unless the IRS retains the ability and then actually does look into the group. This is 
particularly true in the case of a 501(c)(6) which has dues-paying members abroad which are never 

reported to the IRS or anywhere else. So corporate donors giving secretly through non-disclosing 

groups, straw donors giving secretly and improperly if not illegally through LLCs, and foreign donors 

giving secretly and illegally, all are issues of enormous importance for the integrity of the democratic 

process generally and public confidence, specifically. 

In terms of the foreign money, we know, of course, based on scandals of the past, of the 

wherewithal and willingness of foreign donors to contribute in shaping U.S. elections. Is it logical to 

believe that interest is any less now that they can do so in complete anonymity? 

Thank you.