Cash for Clout database: Who’s funding Tennessee’s politics?
Apr 11, 2024 | 7:01 am ET
Description
(Photo illustration by John Partipilo)
This database was first published in July 24, 2023. It has since been updated multiple times. The last update came on April 10, 2024
Every year millions of dollars flow to Nashville, flooding the halls of Tennessee’s state capitol as a small number of deep-pocketed groups attempt to influence lawmakers.
The money comes in many streams through different legal channels, all aiming to influence regulations, push for tax breaks and secure government contracts, often to further private interests instead of the public. The Tennessee Lookout, relying on publicly filed lobbying and campaign finance reports, created a tool to search Tennessee’s top political spenders and recipients.
This tool allows users to discover who’s spending the most cash to influence lawmakers and different ways groups spend money to gain influence. Explore the top donors to every current lawmaker and the politicians raking in the most money.
More than 29,000 companies, people and political associations have donated at least $100 to Tennessee’s current crop of elected officials, their affiliated political action committees (PAC) and the political party PACs.
To start use the search tool below to see who’s giving the most to a politician or caucus (search “Bill Lee” or “Tennessee Democratic Caucus”) or see who’s receiving the most from a company or person (enter “FedEx” or “Boyd, Randy”).
All the information in this article comes from the Tennessee Registry of Election Finance and relies on self-reporting by companies and individuals. If you want to contest any data in this story, email [email protected].
Cash for Clout is an ongoing series examining the influence of money on Tennessee politics. Other articles in the series include:
- Tennessee’s million dollar club
- What happens when a cash-poor billionaire wants a new sports stadium? Lobbying.
- AT&T, the broadband conundrum and a $204 million tax exemption
- Timely donations to Gov. Lee spark rise of Tennessee charter operator with dubious ties
- The $27.1 million clash between education reform and public school advocates
- Connecting the dots between Tennessee’s home builders and bill to deregulate construction on wetlands
Then let’s move onto the leading political spenders in four categories:
- Top overall spending since 2009
- Leading lobbyist during the 2021-22 Tennessee General Assembly
- Top political donor in 2022
- The organization leading the way in independent expenditures backing candidates
Next is the club of 192 companies, families and associations that have each spent more than $1 million on a combination of lobbying, donations and independent expenditures since 2009.
To view the full list of groups that have spent over $1 million since 2009 click here.
Have a tip on how money is influencing decisions at the Tennessee Capitol? Send an email to [email protected]. For encrypting messaging, text 615-249-8509 on Signal, or call the same number.
Then, let’s move on to the politicians and a few of the groups choosing sides in Tennessee politics.
Finally, return to Tennessee’s current crop of elected officials, how much money they have raised and their top 25 donors.
Methodology:
The underlying data for this story comes from a lobbying report database and a campaign finance report database maintained by the Tennessee Bureau of Ethics and Campaign Finance. To create the top donor list, the Lookout combined spending from three categories — lobbying, campaign donations and independent expenditures.
The Bureau provides lobbying expenditures in ranges. For example, when the report said $10,000 to $25,000, the Lookout used $17,500 for the amount spent. When the report said less than $10,000, $1,000 was used.
For campaign donations, the Lookout has tracked contributions to every candidate and political action committee connected to a candidate since 2009.
Contributions to candidates and their PACs were combined when reporting how much they raised. We eliminated all donations from elected officials to their party PACs (Tennessee Legislative Campaign Committee and Tennessee Tomorrow PAC) because often those donations were reimbursements for campaign expenses.
We also did not include all self-donations involved in the 2018 gubernatorial race because Gov. Bill Lee and candidates Randy Boyd, Diane Black and Karl Dean donated significant personal money to each of their campaigns. This database also removed does not include donations lawmakers and their PACs returned.
Independent expenditures were also reported as part of the Tennessee Bureau of Ethics and Campaign Finance campaign database under expenditures. We used a similar method for donations to compile a complete spending list.
Since 2009, several companies, associations, and families have used multiple political action committees, changed their company names, or purchased other companies with political activity in Tennessee. The Lookout combined all the names it could find for a single company, family, or association. All of a past company’s campaign finance and lobbying data were combined under the new company’s name for mergers.
The data behind this story is also available to download
The completely unedited campaign finance database, which contains nearly 2 million rows of data includes donations to lawmakers, lawmakers PAC and donations to any PAC that has operated in Tennessee (from Jan. 1, 2009, to Jan. 15, 2024). (386.4 MB)
An edited form of campaign finance data, which includes donations directly to lawmakers or those who ran for office from Jan. 1, 2009, to Jan. 15, 2024 (77.5 MB)
The Lookout’s lobbying expenditures data (from Jan. 1, 2009, to Dec. 31, 2023) with merged name is available for download by clicking here. (3.5 MB)
Data on independent expenditures (from Jan. 16. 2009 to Jan. 15, 2024). (58.1 MB)
Click here for the link to the Tennessee Bureau of Ethics and Campaign Finance campaign contribution and expenses website.
Click here for the link to the Tennessee Bureau of Ethics and Campaign Finance lobbying website.
Nashville, TN
