Who's Trying to Buy VA's Senate Seat?
Wired & MapLight Influence Tracker Widget Shows U.S. Government vs. Altria
Nov. 4, 2012--The Influence Tracker embeddable widget was created by Wired and MapLight, a nonpartisan research organization that reveals money's influence on politics, to help citizens follow the money behind candidates in presidential and congressional races. A MapLight analysis of campaign finance data from the Federal Election Commission shows Timothy Michael Kaine (D) has raised $14,753,443 to George Allen's (R) $12,429,064 in the Virginia Senate race. Kaine's total ranks him sixth of all 219 senatorial candidates running in the November 6 election. Allen is ranked 10th. The totals include individual and PAC contributions. Widgets are embeddable on media sites and blogs and automatically receive FEC data updates weekly on Mondays.
"Corporate influence in politics has gone off the charts, and it's more important than ever for voters to understand who is financing candidates," said Evan Hansen, Wired.com's editor in chief. "MapLight has done the hard work of compiling the data. At Wired, we're happy to help get that information out to the wider public and share it as broadly as possible with this Web-based embeddable widget."
TIMOTHY MICHAEL KAINE'S TOP CONTRIBUTORS:
GEORGE ALLEN'S TOP CONTRIBUTORS:
Click here to view Timothy Michael Kaine's Influence Tracker Widget.
Click here to view George Allen's Influence Tracker Widget.
In addition to featuring candidates' total contributions, a list of their top 10 donors, and their ranking as a fundraiser within the office they seek, it also ranks their fundraisingederal level. Citizens, bloggers, and media sites can customize the widgets for the presidential race or track the money between candidates in the House and Senate races in their state. Create your own Influence Tracker Widget here.
Data Source: Federal Election Commission.
“In just a few days, voters will confront a ballot filled with candidates whose campaigns have been paid for by wealthy donors. People deserve to know the truth about whose interests their candidates are really representing,” said Daniel G. Newman, MapLight's president and co-founder. “We’re proud to work with Wired to give voters a tool they can use to draw back the curtain on the moneyed influence plaguing our political system.”
A link to this press release can be found here.
MapLight is a nonpartisan political money tracker.
About WIRED:
WIRED is the first word on how ideas and innovation are changing the world. Each month in the magazine and every day online, our editors deliver a glimpse into the future of business, culture, innovation, and science. AdWeek named WIRED to its 2011 Hot List and made WIRED its first-ever “Magazine of the Decade” in 2010. It was named to Advertising Age’s A-List in 2010, received three National Magazine Awards for general excellence in 2005, 2007, and 2009, and was nominated for a National Magazine Award for Magazine of the Year in 2011. Wired.com was named 2009’s Best Magazine Website by AdWeek, Best News, Business & Finance Website in 2009 by MPA Digital, and was a 2011 National Magazine Award for Digital Media “General Excellence” finalist. WIRED and Wired.com reach more than 14 million readers each month.
Media Contact:
Pamela Behrsin
c: 415-299-0898 | e: pamela@maplight.org | t: @imonlyabill
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