May 16, 2007

Shining a light

Maplight.org, this relatively new website, provides a way to connect the money legislators raise with the issues they consider in the Capitol. The database combined records on contributions, bills and supporters and opponents of legislation. That allows the service to give you the top 10 contributors by interest group to each legislator and a rating for how often they voted with that group. They're also tracking some specific bills and the money coming in from interests for and against the legislation. Definitely worth taking a look.

There are always limitations to this sort of analysis. While it's helpful to see the connections, you never know which way the loyalty is flowing. Some members might be voting the way the interest groups ask them to. Others might be voting their ideology, prompting the groups to give to them.

One interesting comparison I stumbled on:

Senate Republican Dick Ackerman rarely votes in line with the interests of his top contributors, according to Maplight. He was most "loyal" to the Native Americans and the utilities, and even with them, he voted against their wishes half the time. His top donor group was Big Pharma, and the site says Ackerman voted with them on only 1 out of 20 bills tracked. Can that be true?

Ackerman's counterpart, Senate Leader Don Perata, meanwhile, has voted with his contibutors most of the time. He's voted with the lawyers 67 percent of the time, with developers 87 percent of the time, and with construction unions 94 percent of the time.

I suspect the disparity generally reflects the fact that Democrat bills tend to reach the floor more often than Republican bills, and Perata votes for them while Ackerman votes against them. But it's still kind of intriguing.

Posted by dweintraub on May 16, 2007 2:43 PM