Big money breaks out

The 100 biggest campaign donors gave $323 million in 2014 — almost as much as the $356 million given by the estimated 4.75 million people who gave $200 or less, a POLITICO analysis of campaign finance filings found.
“As you see that your democracy is controlled by a smaller and smaller number of funders, you have less and less interest to be engaged in it,” said Lessig.
And Ronnie Cameron, an Arkansas poultry company owner who ranked 13th on POLITICO’s list, asserted that, while he and his fellow mega-donors may be writing bigger checks these days, it hasn’t fundamentally changed American politics.
Faulting POLITICO for omitting contributions from labor unions, which lean left, in its analysis (though it also omitted contributions from most major corporations, which tend to lean right), Cameron asserted that wealthy conservative donors — even at their most potent — would only offset the liberal tendencies of influential institutions. “Between Hollywood, the media and the unions, their huge influence by a relative few has long exceeded the influence paid for by people able and willing to give personal money to deliver a message.”
Donors who gave exclusively or primarily to Democratic candidates and groups held down 52 of the top 100 spots — including by far the biggest donor of disclosed 2014 cash: retired San Francisco hedge fund billionaire Tom Steyer.
He donated more than $74 million to Democratic candidates and supportive committees, but it was the way he gave that highlighted both the potential impact and the limitations of the new breed of mega-donor to shape elections.
Campaigns aren’t required to disclose the names or precise amounts of donations that fall short of the $200 threshold, so it’s impossible to know with certainty how many donors accounted for that haul. But the Campaign Finance Institute estimates that the average so-called unitemized donor gives $75, which would mean that roughly 4.75 million donors combined to give the $356 million donated through mid-October.
Of course, the final number of small donors will increase — perhaps significantly — when the final three weeks’ worth of contributions are tallied. But that will be offset at least partially by the number of donors whose aggregate contributions to a committee will cross the $200 threshold — moving them from the category of unitemized micro-donors into the mid-size donor tier.
“When 100 big donors give as much almost 5 million small donors, with whom do we expect candidates to spend their time, and whose interests do we think they will represent?” McKinnon asked. “That’s not democracy. That’s oligarchy.”
Don’t write the obituary for small donors just yet, though, cautioned California vintner John Jordan, whose $2.4 million in 2014 donations supporting conservatives ranked him 28th on POLITICO’s top donor list.
“Small donor activity is probably the best leading indicator for voter intensity in your own party,” he said. “A fired-up activist is going to talk to friends and neighbors, is going to post on Facebook, is going to volunteer at the campaign. So a small donor’s value is really much greater than a small contribution,” said Jordan.