IN THE 2010 CITIZENS UNITED CASE, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations can spend unlimited amounts on elections. As a result of that decision people on both sides of the aisle feared that corporations would flood campaigns with vast amounts corporate money, forever changing the world of campaign finance and the political landscape of this country. However, that hasn’t been the case. Instead, recent changes in American political spending have come from the rise of Super PACs backed by hugely wealthy private individuals such as Tom Steyer or the Koch brothers. Instead of pouring money into political campaigns, corporations have focused on lobbying efforts. Lee Drutman, a senior fellow in the political reform program at New America, argues that this is because“Lobbying offers a much better return than election spending because real power lies in influencing how policymakers think about the world, not in getting them elected.”
In her recent article in the Washington Post Ms. Drutman observes, “From 1998 onward, as far back as there is good data, corporations have consistently spent about 13 times more on lobbying than they have on campaign contributions. That’s not to say they don’t spend on campaigns. In the 2013-14 cycle, corporations, trade associations and business associations spent a combined $381 million through their political action committees. But that’s small potatoes compared with the giant $5.2 billion pot roast of reported corporate lobbying expenses over this period. And about half of lobbying doesn’t even get reported.”
There are two main reasons why corporations choose to spend their money influencing lawmakers via lobbying rather than spending large amounts of money on political campaign and election activities such as campaign and Super PAC contributions. “First, it could create unnecessary enemies. If the candidate you opposed wins despite your efforts, you’ve just made somebody mad at you. Likewise, if you give big to a Republican or Democratic super PAC, you’ve just angered an entire party. Second, hefty election spending runs the risk of upsetting consumers outside the Beltway. If some of your customers are Democrats and some are Republicans, a really big check could be more trouble than it’s worth. Target learned this when it gave $150,000 to a group supporting conservative Tom Emmer in the 2010 Minnesota gubernatorial race, alienating its many customers who opposed Emmer’s anti-gay-marriage stance.”
