The Republicans
McCain’s Land Swap Deja Vu
BY Caitlin Ginley | May 09, 2008
Republican John McCain’s controversial 2005 land swap deal, reported today by The Washington Post, is eerily reminiscent of a similar situation reported by the Center for Public Integrity in its book The Buying of the President 2000.
More >McCain Filling Up with Gas Money?
BY Caitlin Ginley AND Josh Israel | April 16, 2008
In a Tax Day speech Tuesday, Republican John McCain announced a series of economic stimulus proposals, most notably a summer-long suspension of the federal gasoline tax. With the national average cost of gas looming at more than $3.38 per gallon, the plan would impose a moratorium on collection of the 18.4-cent-tax between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
More >The Longest Campaign — Part Five
BY Jules Witcover | March 28, 2008
All it took was a single clever idea. As a result, the federal financing of presidential campaigns, which was showing signs of decrepitude a quarter-century after the Watergate scandals that inspired it, is all but dead.
More >The Longest Campaign — Part Four
BY Jules Witcover | March 27, 2008
A dollar is a dollar—except in politics, where some dollars are “hard” and some are “soft.” This hard-versus-soft distinction was invented by election lawyers and other political operatives looking for a way around the sweeping campaign-finance reforms ushered in by the Watergate scandal. It didn’t take them long.
More >The Longest Campaign — Part Three
BY Jules Witcover | March 26, 2008
Politics abounds with irony. Only four months before the Watergate break-in that would set off the greatest political scandal of the 20th century and lead to his resignation in disgrace, President Nixon finally signed the Federal Election Campaign Act—but it did nothing to stem the flow of big contributions to his reelection campaign.
More >The Longest Campaign — Part Two
BY Jules Witcover | March 25, 2008
Henry Ford ushered in not only the age of mass production, but also the age of scandalous excess in political campaigns. World War I riveted his interest in politics, and, in 1918, he ran for the U.S. Senate from Michigan. He lost, surprisingly, to a Republican opponent who ran what was branded a “money barrel” campaign.
More >The Longest Campaign
BY Jules Witcover | March 24, 2008
Back in the 1960s, when Jesse Unruh, the speaker of the California General Assembly, famously branded money “the mother’s milk of politics,” the extremes and excesses of the years ahead were probably beyond his imagination.
Today, running for the nation’s highest office has become so costly that by the time the November election rolls around total presidential campaign spending will, in all likelihood, easily exceed $1 billion for the first time in history. From Day One of every presidential campaign, how well candidates fare in amassing their war chests is a critical factor in how they are portrayed by the press and in how well they can make their cases to the public.
More >The Kerry Precedent
BY Josh Israel AND Devin Varsalona | February 26, 2008
By the time John Kerry had virtually locked up the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004, he’d already been branded “a handmaiden of special interests,” a Washington elitist, and a hypocrite — and that just by members of his own party. Early in the year, The Washington Post reported that the Massachusetts senator had raised more money from lobbyists over the previous 15 years than any other senator. Kerry’s campaign had sought to portray him as a presidential candidate who would block special interests from the corridors of power. The Post story suggested that he might hold the entryways open for them.
Democrats Win Super Tuesday “Money Primary”
BY Devin Varsalona | February 08, 2008
The two contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination each raised more money in 19 Super Tuesday states than the three Republican hopefuls combined, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis.
Hillary Clinton topped fundraising in those states at just over $58 million, while fellow Democrat Barack Obama raised $47 million. They were followed by Republicans Mitt Romney ($27.5 million), John McCain ($16 million), and Mike Huckabee ($2.3 million).
More >Mitt Romney’s Deep Pockets
BY Josh Israel AND Sarah Laskow | February 04, 2008
With the winnowing of the presidential field, Republican Mitt Romney is the only remaining contender who has donated or loaned money to his own campaign, according to Federal Election Commission filings made available last week.
More >Fourth-Quarter Scores
BY Josh Israel | January 31, 2008
The candidates have filed their campaign-finance reports for the fourth quarter of 2007, covering the period from October 1 to December 31.
More >From the Archives
BY Sarah Laskow | January 09, 2008
In the 2000 edition of The Buying of the President, the Center examined Republican John McCain’s financial connections in Nevada, which holds its caucuses this year on January 19. Here is an excerpt:
In February 1999, McCain took a testing-the-waters trip for a presidential bid. But he didn’t trek through the snowy fields of Iowa or the meeting houses of New Hampshire. Instead he headed straight for Las Vegas.
Sin of Omission?
BY Sarah Laskow | December 21, 2007
Washington lawyer Bruce Fein, who writes a weekly column for The Washington Times, used the venue to attack Senator John McCain without disclosing that he had agreed to be an adviser to Representative Ron Paul, one of McCain’s rivals in the race for the GOP presidential nomination.
More >Huckabee’s 2000 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 18, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2000:
More >Huckabee’s 2001 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 18, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2001:
More >
Huckabee’s 2002 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 11, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2002:
Huckabee’s 2003 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 11, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2003:
More >Huckabee’s 2004 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 11, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2004:
More >Huckabee’s 2005 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 11, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2005:
More >Huckabee’s 2006 Gift List
BY Sarah Laskow | December 10, 2007
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accepted gifts valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars during his years as governor of Arkansas. Here are the gifts valued at more than $100 that Huckabee and his wife reported receiving in 2006:
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