The 2016 money race has begun
Campaign finance regulations prevent donors from giving directly to candidates who have not officially launched their presidential bids. This means that, for now, the only way to see how the various 2016 hopefuls are doing in the money race is through quarterly reports from PACs, which don't necessarily exist for each of the candidates.
However, a company called Crowdpac recently obtained an advisory opinion from the Federal Election Commission that allows them to collect donations on behalf of all the potential 2016 candidates. Crowdpac will transfer these contributions to the White House hopefuls who end up officially launching and they'll return money for canddiates who end up giving up before they come out of the gate to donors.
Because of this advisory opinion, Crowdpac is currently the only place where anyone can make a direct donation to the major likely candidates in the 2016 presidential race - and they're going to show us the numbers.
Business Insider will be exclusively partnering with Crowdpac as the race shapes up. They'll be providing us with weekly updates about the donations they're receiving. This means that, for now, we will be the only place you can get fundraising information about the various top candidates.
Crowdpac is dedicated to making it "easier for citizens to learn about politicians, and to find and support political candidates that match their priorities and beliefs." Because of this mission, along with helping people make early donations directly to the candidates of their choice, Crowdpac has used FEC campaign finance data and voting records to create a scoring system that allows you to see exactly where various politicians and megadonors fall on the ideological spectrum.
Along with providing you updates on the 2016 money race, we'll be working with Crowdpac to crunch their decades of campaign contribution data to bring you posts and charts that shed new light on the political landscape. Today, we've got stories on Wall Street's top megadonors and the political leanings of Fortune 500 CEOs.
We'll publish the first data on how the various candidates are performing with donors next week. And if you want to have a personal say in this 2016 money race, you can make a donation on Crowdpac here.