We’ve made no secret of the fact that OpenSecrets.org has been nominated for a Webby Award. We’re proud to be considered one of the top five politics sites in the world!

But we could be No. 1. We’re currently in second place for the Webby People’s Voice Award, and we need your votes to propel us to the top spot.

In fact, we need them in the next two days — voting ends on April 24.

Please vote for us — we can’t do it without you!

Herewith, some grounds for persuasion: A quick look at all the new, groundbreaking, or just plain cool additions to OpenSecrets.org this year.

1) Brand-New Issue Profiles



Passionate about climate change? Curious about the role of the defense industry in elections and policy decisions? We’ve added Defense and Energy & Climate Change pages to our Issue Profiles. We’ll soon be posting one on gambling, and another on patents.

2) The Anomaly Tracker

Sometimes, when you’re looking at campaign finance data, something looks amiss — lawmakers sponsoring legislation that only one company — whose PAC or employees donated to said lawmaker — seems interested in, for instance, or members of Congress who receive more than 50 percent of their contributions from out-of-state. Last year, we developed a fun and easy way to look at these “anomalies” all in one place with the Anomaly Tracker.



3) 10 Things They Won’t Tell You About Money in Politics

Tracking money in federal politics is essential to knowing more about political candidates, as well as to understanding what’s behind election outcomes and even policy decisions, but what’s in the data isn’t always apparent to the naked eye. We tried to help with 10 Things Every Voter Should Know About Money in Politics.

However, we came to realize that that alone wasn’t enough; the world of money-in-politics is filled with insider jargon and little tricks the average voter may not be aware of. We laid some of them out last year in 10 Things They Won’t Tell You About Money in Politics.

4) A New, Improved Action Center

As an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, the Center for Responsive Politics does not advocate for specific legislation or regulations in any area — with one important exception: transparency.

Help us keep government accountable by making a donation today.

If you agree with our mission of empowering citizens with information made available by a more transparent, accountable government, explore our new and improved Action Center. We’ve listed Action Items, or current initiatives/legislation that our users can support, as well as an Action Wishlist of proposals we hope will gain momentum in Congress. Be sure to check our Calendar of Events and our revolving Featured Event, as well, for information on transparency and open government-related events in your area.

5) Data on Joint Fundraising Committees

Joint fundraising committees are organizations created by two or more candidates, PACs, or party committees — or some combination of those — that share the costs of fundraising and split the proceeds. Due to the recent Supreme Court Decision in McCutcheon v. FEC, some observers believe that JFCs will proliferate, and that they’ll be bigger, since wealthy donors will no longer have to worry about hitting an overall cap on how much they can give. JFC’s can potentially involve many different candidates or committees — and solicit one donor for a mega-donation. In light of the possible rise of JFCs in this election cycle, we created our Joint Fundraising Committees page, with information on donors and recipients to these groups — information not available in easy-to-use format anywhere else.



6) In-Depth Organization Profiles

Companies, unions, super PACs — all the entities we categorize as organizations — put a significant amount of money into the political process, whether through company PACs, union lobbyists, or super PAC ad buys. As of this year, all of our organization profiles — not just those for the very biggest players — contain detailed information

7) Huge Strides in Tracking Political Nonprofits

2013 was the year of dark money for OpenSecrets.org! In addition to writing award-winning blog posts for our Shadow Money Trail series, we greatly expanded the scope of information we offer on nondisclosing political nonprofit groups in our Outside Spending section.

Because they do not disclose their donors, political nonprofits are notoriously hard to follow — but we have the most information on these mysterious groups anywhere. Check it all out in our groundbreaking Political Nonprofits section, which includes our 990s Extracts Search.

Every day, our hardworking staff parses, slices, dices, and otherwise adds value to data from the FEC, IRS, and other government agencies to make it easily available and easy to use. We put the “real” in real-time data by making these numbers understandable and putting them in context through all parts of OpenSecrets.org and the OpenSecrets Blog.

We’re proud to have been a leader in following the money for the past 30 years. Please help us add a 2014 Webby Award to our list of hard-earned honors! Vote for us here.

P.S.: If you follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, or Pinterest, you may have seen other reasons (some silly, some serious) that we think OpenSecrets.org should #WinaWebby. Check them out.

Follow Sarah on Twitter: @sflocken



For permission to reprint for commercial uses, such as textbooks, contact the Center: Feel free to distribute or cite this material, but please credit the Center for Responsive Politics.For permission to reprint for commercial uses, such as textbooks, contact the Center: [email protected]





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