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Campaign Finance Disclosure in the States: An Overview

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State Campaign Finance Disclosure Laws

Number of states that require reporting of last-minute contributions: 34
Number of states that require a contributor’s occupation and employer to be disclosed: 28
Number that require a contributor’s occupation to be disclosed, but not employer: 6
Number that require a contributor’s employer to be disclosed, but not occupation: 2
Number of states that do not require contributor occupation or employer information: 14
Number of states that require expenditures to be described in campaign disclosure reports: 48
Number of states that require both a descriptive code and a plain language description of each expenditure: 9
Number of states that require a plain language expenditure description only: 38
Number of states that require descriptive expenditure codes only: 1
Number of states that require disclosure of subvendor expenditures made on behalf of a campaign: 20
Number of states that require independent expenditures to be disclosed: 39
Number of states that require last-minute independent expenditures to be disclosed: 21
Number of states that direct their disclosure agencies to conduct “desk reviews” of campaign finance reports: 30
Number of states that direct their disclosure agencies to conduct field audits of campaign finance reports: 13

Electronic Filing of Campaign Finance Reports

Number of states that require candidates to electronically file campaign disclosure reports: 21
Number of these 21 states that require electronic filing by both legislative and statewide candidates: 15
Number of these 21 states that have an electronic filing mandate for statewide candidates and a voluntary electronic filing program for legislative candidates: 6
Number of states with a voluntary electronic filing program: 17
Number of states with no electronic filing program: 12

Disclosure Data - Access and Usability

Number of state disclosure web sites that tell the public what data can and cannot be found on the site: 22
Number of sites that provide information about campaign finance restrictions and disclosure reporting requirements: 45
Number of sites that provide only information about disclosure reporting requirements: 5
Number of state disclosure agencies that post campaign finance data on the Internet: 47
Number of state disclosure agencies that post no campaign finance on the Internet: 3
Number of state disclosure web sites with searchable, online databases of contributions: 30
Number of state disclosure web sites with searchable, online databases of expenditures: 20
Number of searchable expenditure databases in states without electronic filing: 0
Number of states where disclosure data can be sorted online: 20
Number of states with electronic filing that allow the public to download disclosure data from the agency's web site: 24
Number of states without electronic filing that allow the public to download data from the agency’s web site: 3

Thanks to Harper's magazine for permission to use its "index" format.

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This page was first published on October 25, 2004
| Last updated on October 25, 2004
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