Scott Limbocker

The Political Geography of Campaign Finance: Contributions to 2008 Republican Presidential Candidates

In fundraising, potential candidates who do not collect sizable amounts of “early money” may be effectively eliminated even before the start of the Iowa Caucus. This winnowing raises concern about the impact money has on narrowing the field of candidates from whom voters can choose. To better grasp patterns of successful fundraising, we explore where candidates obtain funds during the preprimary and primary periods. We use individual contributions data from the Federal Election Commission during the preprimary and primary periods of the 2008 Republican presidential nomination contest. Findings suggest that although California, New York, and Texas provide disproportionate amounts of early financing, the ability of presidential aspirants to broaden their support is indicative of campaign success.

The Political Geography of Campaign Contributions

By all accounts, presidential elections are costly undertakings. Will Rogers once stated, “Politics has got so expensive that it takes lots of money to even get beat with nowadays” (Rogers 1931). While Rogers comically exaggerated the cost of elections nearly a century ago, today campaigns and elections take substantial amounts of money, a reality that is often underestimated in American politics. One estimate of the combined cost of the 2012 presidential nomination and general election was

Party cohesion in presidential races Applying social network theory to the preprimary multiple donor networks of 2004 and 2008

2.6 billion (Choma 2013). This raises the obvious question: Where does this money come from? Surprisingly, even though spending by wealthy individuals and outside groups has risen dramatically in recent years, the majority of the money raised still comes from individual donors (Christenson and Smidt 2012).

Party cohesion in presidential races: applying social network theory to the 2011 preprimary

Scholars have long been examining the presidential nomination process in the United States. In addition to studies considering the selection mechanism itself, there has been a movement towards analysing the contest even before voting begins. Campaign finance allows for a reliable and valid means to examine the year prior to the nomination with data that are not just vast in quantity but also consistent across time. Donors who gave to multiple campaigns represent a particularly important subset of elite participants in elections whose behaviour shed light on phenomena of parties functioning as a network. We find only rare instances of multiple donors giving across party and that Democratic contributors function as a far more cohesive unit. Also, without any supervising entity, the candidate that amasses the most shared donors goes on to win the nomination in the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections.

Conclusion and Discussion

In this paper we analyze individual contributions data from the 2012 Republican Party preprimary that was collected by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC). We use the basic principles of Social Network Analysis of multiple donors to discern patterns concerning presidential candidates and the Republican Party as a whole.

Median Income: An Alternative Explanation for Campaign Contributions

This book attempts to tackle the complex relationship between geography and individual campaign contributions in the early stages of a presidential race, specifcally the increasingly important preprimary period. Even more than the decision to cast a ballot, giving money to a political campaign is a rare act of political involvement exercised by a minority of citizens in the United States. This type of support becomes even less common when one considers the relatively small percentage of Americans who participate by contributing during the early days of a presidential campaign when organizations are just beginning to be built by candidates and their staffs. The uncommon individual, the “1 in every 1,500,” who participates during the early stage of fundraising by contributing makes this a signifcant decision not only for the donor but also for the candidate. This is because the ability to raise money is a crucial, though not necessarily deterministic, indicator of who will win their respective party’s presidential nomination to contend for the White House.

The Timing of Presidential Campaign Contributions

Scholars have studied political participation in the context of campaigns and elections for decades. Assessing who participates is fundamental to understanding the democratic process, as those who participate have a much stronger voice in the policies and politics of their country than nonparticipants do. Put differently, those who vote and/or donate money to political candidates exhibit an infuence on electoral outcomes, while those who do not participate, by defnition, do not have a voice in the democratic process. Yet, nearly half of eligible voters do not vote, even in presidential general elections (McDonald and Popkin 2001), with far fewer contributing money to political candidates (Brown et al. 1995).

A Tale of Two Parties? Do Republicans and Democratic Contenders Have Different Geographical Fundraising Bases?

Fundraising activities in the year prior to the start of the formal primary season, in other words the preprimary period, play a substantial role in determining presidential nomination outcomes both directly and indirectly.1 First, this fundraising has a direct effect on campaign operations as candidates can either spend these funds on the resources necessary for modern electioneering, such as television advertising, or pay salary for campaign staffers. Second, campaign money indirectly serves as a marker of viability that has the potential to influence other important actors, such as political elites, mass media, and primary voters, and their willingness to consider a presidential bid as legitimate (Adkins and Dowdle 2002; Stewart 2015). Candidates who raise money successfully during this period often do well once the formal contests begin and are often able to weather early losses, or what George W. Bush termed “bumps in the road” after early losses in 2000 to John McCain in New Hampshire and Arizona (Adkins and Dowdle 2004). Candidates who do poorly are often “winnowed” or forced to leave the race (Norrander 2000; Haynes et al. 2004).

Participation in the Early Financing of Presidential Candidates

Campaign donations early on in the electoral process serve as a barometer of citizen enthusiasm and trust; however, they also serve as a benchmark for the strength and cohesion of the political parties. For example, higher campaign donations in the early stages of the election can be an indicator of success for the respective political parties (Damore 1997; Adkins and Dowdle 2002; Norrander 2006). Candidates who are able to secure a substantial amount of money, especially in the primary stage, generally have heightened success in electoral outcomes (Norrander 2006).

Multiple Donors and the Party as a Network

American philosopher John Rawls once wrote: “In constant pursuit of money to finance campaigns, the political system is simply unable to function” (Rawls 1999, 140). Despite Rawls’s assertion, money is a fundamental reality of US campaigns and elections. Recent decisions by the US Supreme Court in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (FEC) (2010) and Wisconsin Right to Life v. FEC (2007) to overturn campaign finance laws have reduced the barriers designed to keep a flood of money from entering into elections. They have also upset specific provisions or bans on soft money spending established by earlier laws such as the Tillman Act of 1907,1 the Taft–Hartley Act of 1947,2 and the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) of 2002.3 As a result, increasing amounts of money are being contributed to and spent on the political process.