Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group

Revolving door boosts private equity lobbying

The Private Equity Growth Capital Council has a new president with Democratic credentials who has been through Washington's revolving door.

Super PACs have spent most on Florida ad buys, so far

While the polls have constantly fluctuated in the last week before Tuesday's GOP presidential primary in Florida, one number has seen a steady rise: the campaign money being pumped into the Sunshine State. Helping to boost the total: The two super PACs supporting frontrunners Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich have spent more than $15 million in the state. That number makes 38 percent of all presidential super PAC spending that Sunlight is tracking.

Gingrich super PAC super donor Sheldon Adelson has businesses under scrutiny by IRS, Justice

Billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and his wife, Miriam, who have reportedly given a combined $10 million to Winning Our Future, the super PAC that supports and is run by former staffers of Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, were drawn to him by a shared view of the importance of the U.S. relationship to Israel.

GOP lawmakers reopen fight over Keystone XL pipeline

As House Republicans reopen efforts Wednesday to win approval for the Keystone XL energy project, new lobbying records filed over the weekend reveal a lopsided spending battle over the controversial proposed pipeline.

Despite Fed's steps toward transparency, much remains opaque

In a bid to increase transparency, the Federal Reserve will for the first time make public the forecasts for benchmark interest rates that will inform discussions at tomorrow's meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), which sets monetary policy for the nation. But despite this action, there is still plenty of opacity in how the Fed conducts business.

PAC Profile: The Tea Party doesn't need unlimited money to make a splash

It's hard to believe given this year's headlines, but not all of the political action committees making an impact on this year's campaign are super PACs.

Gabrielle Giffords leaves Congress with a big war chest

No restriction on how Pro-Perry super PAC can spend funds

Texas Gov. Rick Perry's decision to drop his bid for the GOP presidential nomination Thursday raises a tantalizing question: What will happen to the big-spending super PAC that dropped close to $4 million backing his campaign?

Super PAC profile: Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart 'not coordinating'

In what may be one of the most pointed political jokes since Jonathan Swift's Modest Proposal, Stephen Colbert's satirical mystery tour has arrived in South Carolina.

Regulators lobbied by industry testify on Volcker rule

Federal regulators have had at least 89 meetings with outside groups, most of them big banking interests, about the controversial "Volcker rule," the provision in the Dodd-Frank financial law that prohibits banks from making bets with their own money. The effort to curb the practice, widely held to be a contributor to the 2008 financial meltdown, was the subject of a hearing in Congress today.

Super PAC profile: Pro-Ron Paul group has corporate address

Heading into the South Carolina primary, Santa Rita super PAC had created seven ads that appear on its YouTube channel. According to FEC records the PAC spent $317,500 producing ads and buying time on 14 channels for a promised 11-day ad blitz before Palmetto State voters head to the polls Saturday.

Super PAC profile: 1911 United—a new kind of committee?

Although one of its founders is a longtime D.C. political insider found by an independent probe last year to have wasted D.C. taxpayers’ money, the pro-Obama super PAC 1911 United claims to have a more populist bent than other independent committees that have sprung up in the wake of the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling.

Bain Capital tops list of Romney's career political supporters

Bain Capital, the private equity firm that Mitt Romney has touted as the source of his business acumen and one of his opponents for the Republican nomination has labeled "vultures" is the largest source of political money for the former Massachusetts governor over the course of his career.

Data lacking on private student loans

With student debt rising to a projected $1 trillion and concerns rising in the Occupy Wall Street movement and beyond about the bursting of the student loan bubble, the new federal consumer protection agency has set a Tuesday deadline for the public to send in data and stories about the rapidly expanding private student loan market—loans students are getting from banks and, increasingly, by for-profit universities such as Corinthian Colleges and DeVry University.