Senator Obama And Republican Romney Campaign Money

Each year billions of dollars are spent on getting candidates of various offices of government elected. Many candidates have had tremendous success through the efforts of much needed monetary contributions to their campaign. Contributors range from unions, religious leaders, organizations such as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers (MADD), the National Rifle Association (NRA), and senior citizens groups. When these groups, known as special interest groups, donate to candidate’s campaign, they expect the candidate to respond to their issues. Because special interest groups, as well as private citizens donate more and more money to campaigns, there is some concern that there is a great need for campaign finance reform.

From the very first elections held in the United States, there has always been a strong link between money and politics. During the first elections in the late 1700’s you had to be a white male landowner over the age of 21 in order to vote, meaning that you had to have money in order to have your vote counted. It seems today that we cannot go a day with out seeing campaign finance in the media, whether or not it is through advertisements for politicians in the media or asked to donate money to help let your favorite candidate win. Because campaign finance has always been on the back burner of political issues, there has hardly been any change to the large influence money has over the election process and politicians. While money has it’s

elections all the way to choosing the next president of the united states. In recent years however there has been an upsurge of people making an independent political action committees called super PAC. Super PACs are unique due to them being allowed to spend an unlimited amount of funds in support which ever candidate they choose. there are however some strings attach to super PACs such as them not being allowed to give money they have collected directly to the candidate or coordinating with the candidate's own political action committee. Super PACs have created a issue on whether it is fair to the opponents of whoever is running against them if they do not have a super PAC, because they can not match the amount of spending a person has spent on political ads or other forms to help get votes when compared to people who have a super PAC helping them.

It is time that the voters are the only one’s deciding elections. Candidates should be running on issues, not money. They should not be allowed to get money from wealthy investors, who keep the playing field unlevel. Any person who wants to run for office, and is qualified to run for office, should be able to regardless if they have a lot of money to set up a campaign or not. It is time for Campaign Finance Reform.

Another argument agrees that money increasingly dominates the US electoral process and is the main factor in contributing to a candidate’s success is that candidates who spend more generally win. In 2012, Mitt Romney’s

Fundraising success correlates strongly with electoral success. In 2002, 95 percent of House winners raised more than their opponents. In 2004, more than 95 percent of House winners outspent their opponents. (4 “Money Is the Victor in 2002 Midterm Elections,” Center for Responsive Politics, Nov. 6, 2002. 5 “2004 Election Outcome: Money Wins,” Center for Responsive Politics, Nov. 3,

In the 2016 election cycle, over 1.4 billion dollars was given to presidential candidates (Federal Election Commission 2016a). This is more than any other presidential election cycle in history (Price 2016). Another billion dollars was given to U.S. House of Representatives candidates, and about 600 million dollars was given to U.S. Senate candidates (Federal Election Commission 2016b). The majority of this money went to funding the candidates’ campaigns. This money controlled whose ads voter’s saw on television and which candidates were able to afford to travel the country campaigning for votes. In many cases, the candidate with the most money available won their election. Most campaigns are financed in large part by a small number

The Democratic and Republican presidential nominees for 1999 raised an astounding 126 million to finance their campaigns in the primaries (Godfrey). The U.S. national political parties raised a record 107.2 million dollars in soft money contributions in 1999 (Campaign Finance Reform). During the 1995-96 elections, public citizens estimated that an astounding 150 million dollars was spent on "phony" issue ads designed to support or oppose congressional and presidential candidates (Campaign Finance Reform). This outrageous influx of money into congressional and presidential campaigns has placed a blanket of corruption and injustice over our nation’s elections. With the rise of campaign corruption, many

The election of members to Congress in the United States of America is contingent on the financial muscles of the candidates and their supporters. It all starts with a deep pocket investment. The recently concluded election will yield a new administration with new cabinet members. The election of Donald Trump as the next U.S President is partly attributable to the synergy and efforts made by some of the most influential people in the Republican Convention. With Trump already appointing some of his chief strategists, it is necessary to conduct a deeper analysis of the financial input of other members of the Congress in an attempt to gain seats.

Money has played a large part in this shift from party-centered to candidate-centered elections. As campaigns have grown more expensive, candidates have come to rely increasingly on their own fundraising abilities or personal fortunes to win public office. For example, about $6 billion was spent on the 2012 presidential election campaigns. On average, winning candidates for a seat in the House of Representatives spent $1.5 million each. Winners of each Senate seat spent an average of $9.7 million. In future elections, the cost will likely be even

With the introduction of “soft” money in politics, elections no longer go to the best candidate, but simply to the richer one. Soft money is defined as unregulated money that is given to the political parties that ends up being used by candidates in an election. In last year’s elections, the Republican and Democratic parties raised more than one-half of a billion dollars in soft money. Current politicians are pushing the envelope farther than any previous administrations when it comes to finding loopholes in the legal system for campaign fundraising. The legal limit that any one person can contribute to a given candidate or campaign is one thousand dollars. There is, however, no limit on the amount of money one

With the upcoming presidential election, it has been interesting to learn about things as they are actually happening in our country today. Among the many issues that surround the race to the office, financing the presidential election seems to be a major topic that is always in the public eye.      There are many different views on how the election should be financed but it is hard to tell how far government funding and donations can go before democracy is left behind.

Candidates such as Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are surrounded by money. This will allow for easy unlimited funding from the citizens who agree with their views and will benefit from them winning. Presidents would obviously reward these organizations once elected in one way or another. This will allow wealthy individuals to make a much more significant impact on elections. While old PACs had a cap on how much could be donated by individuals, while prohibiting organizations and companies from donating, these new “isolates” super PACs can receive unlimited donations. A major company may decide to spend a few million dollars to support a specific candidate if it could return profit on the investment from taxation policies the winning candidate puts in place. This puts a large importance on money in the election, and less on debates and views. This is shown in the current election, with two of the candidates being some of the biggest financial influencers in the United States. Donald Trump is one of the faces of the business world and has huge influences in the business world. Hillary Clinton was a former first lady and has many large backings. This election has two of the biggest iconic faces in this country, most likely due to this new

Many studies have demonstrated that this culture is alive and well, for example, “scholars have found that campaign contributions influenced votes on trade policy and banking regulations and that contributions from the banking sector were associated with a greater likelihood to vote for the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, which bailed out the largest U.S. banks,” (Craig an..). Other examples of this could be the NRA’s campaign contributions advancing an anti-gun control agenda, or even the Koch brothers and their attack on clean

Campaign finance reform is a hot topic these days yet none the less a very