Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group

1. Buzzfeed's five surprising charts show impact of Citizens United

   By Bill Allison Sep 27, 2012 3:02 p.m.

   Buzzfeed offers five surprising charts about political money in the 2012 election cycle, feeding off of this recent release from the Federal Election Commission tallying up contributions and spending through June 2012. What they show--by omission--is how much Citizens United and subsequent court decisions and FEC rulings have changed the way campaigns raise and spend money. A few examples:

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2. King of fundraising: Obama leads Romney by $242 million

   By Bill Allison Sep 21, 2012 2:33 p.m.

   While the most recent Gallup poll shows registered voters equally split, at 47 percent a piece, in the money race President Barack Obama has an unassailable lead. 

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3. Obama's fundraising paves way for advertising dominance

   By Bill Allison Sep 20, 2012 1:56 p.m.

   When it comes to saturating the airwaves and cable outlets with political advertisements, no entity has spent more in the 2012 presidential elections than the campaign of President Barack Obama. Through July, his campaign spent more than $111 million broadcasting its message--more than twice the $48 million spent by his GOP rival, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Both campaigns will disclose their itemized contributions and expenditures for August with the Federal Election Commission today.

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4. Introducing Econocheck

   By Bill Allison Sep 20, 2012 11:29 a.m.

   When Mitt Romney claims, as he did in a private talk at a fundraiser for well-heeled donors, that 47 percent of Americans do not pay income taxes, where can one check his math? When President Barack Obama tells David Letterman and his audience that he doesn't know how much the national debt is, what's the best place to get the latest number? When a member of Congress claims federal spending has been cut to the bone, what's the best place to check that claim?

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5. Four years after Lehman Brothers collapse, financial industry still works its political will

   By Bill Allison Sep 14, 2012 12:55 p.m.

   Like the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand that touched off World War I, the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the largest underwriter of bonds backed by subprime loans when it declared bankruptcy on Sept. 15, 2008, was an event whose repercussions extended far beyond its executives, investors and creditors. It touched off a financial crisis that's affected employment and earnings of the middle class.

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6. Obama's fundraising machine leaves Romney in the dust

   By Bill Allison Sep 11, 2012 12:32 p.m.

   So can we finally stop hearing the erroneous claim that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is winning the fundraising battle against President Barack Obama, the all-time champion when it comes to vacuuming up campaign cash? In August, the GOP nominee had his best month of fundraising--and fell about $2 million short of Obama's haul.

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7. Sex and taxes: What the Romney returns and the Edwards precedent say about political slush funds

   By Bill Allison Sep 10, 2012 11:47 a.m.

   The cloak and dagger tale circulating on the Internet about a group of hackers who claim to have purloined old tax returns of GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney and say they will release them to whomever is first to pay their ransom suggests why a federal court case that absolved former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards of campaign finance crimes was wrongly decided.

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8. Introducing the new and improved Party Time

   By Bill Allison Aug 20, 2012 12:11 p.m.

   Just in time for the really big political parties in Tampa and Charlotte, Party Time's gussied up!

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9. First light on dark money: Bloomberg gun control group discloses donors

   By Bill Allison Aug 7, 2012 12:22 p.m.

   When Mayors Against Illegal Guns Action Fund, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's vehicle for pushing for tighter gun control regulation, ran ads Sunday morning calling on President Barack Obama and his Republican opponent, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, to offer plans to reduce gun violence, they became the first dark money group to publicly disclose its donors.

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10. Romney falls further behind Obama in race for campaign cabbage

    By Bill Allison Aug 6, 2012 3:45 p.m.

    Mitt Romney and President Obama have released their July campaign fundraising totals, and the Republican challenger continues to fall further behind the incumbent in the race to raise the most money.

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11. Romney surging, but Obama well ahead in campaign cash

    By Bill Allison Jul 11, 2012 10:11 a.m.

    For Mitt Romney, the magic number is $158 million. That's how much he'll have to outraise President Barack Obama over the last four months of the campaign to surpass the president, the record holder for campaign fundraising.

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12. Zynga places bet on lobbyists, hires two D.C. firms

    By Bill Allison Jun 6, 2012 1:46 p.m.

    Following a familiar path for high tech companies, social networking game platform Zynga has hired its first Washington lobbyists, filings with the Senate Office of Public Records show. The company seeks to influence legislation "pertaining to regulation and taxation of Internet gambling" as well as online privacy policy.

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13. Kentucky Derby: Owners put money on politicians, not ponies

    By Bill Allison May 3, 2012 3:10 p.m.
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14. Super PAC profile: Group focused on healthcare repeal has shadowy sister

    By Bill Allison Apr 27, 2012 5:37 p.m.

    This week, Restore America's Voice PAC has disclosed its first political spending of the 2012 election cycle--more than $50,000 worth of phone call fundraising pitches that mention President Barack Obama--but a shadowy nonprofit tied to the group has spent millions more attacking Obama and congressional Democrats for the healthcare reform act.

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Investigations by Sunlight Foundation reporter Bill Allison