On Wednesday, Rep. John Sarbanes (D-Md.) introduced H.R. 20, or the “Government by the People Act,” after announcing his intention to do so the previous day in a Washington Post op-ed with Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Among other things, the bill would seek to counter the effects of the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. FEC. It would create a $25 political contributions tax credit for small donors (those giving $200 or less) as well as a fund that would match small donor contributions at a rate of up to $9 for every $1 given. Moreover, the “Government By the People Act” would allow additional funds to be released to candidates who raise a certain amount of money from small donors prior to a general election.

Sarbanes’ bill is the latest in a string of attempts to push back against the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, which, according to Pelosi and Sarbanes,”opened the floodgates to millions of dollars in secret, special-interest spending on elections.” Other efforts include the DISCLOSE Act, which was first introduced in 2010 and has been re-introduced since.



Sarbanes himself doesn’t get much of his campaign money from small donors, though he’s trying. In the 2012 election cycle, House Democrats on average raised 11 percent of their funds from small individual donors, 46 percent from large individual donors, and 38 percent from PACs. In comparison, Sarbanes’ campaign committee raised just 5 percent of its funds from small donors, with 94 percent from large donors and just $3,000 from PACs, and he’s on a similar track in the 2014 cycle.

Which brings us to this week’s Politquizz question:

“Individuals in which industry have contributed the most to Sarbanes’ campaign committee over the course of his career? Which one comes in sixth? And what percentage of his funds came from small individual donors in the 2010 campaign cycle?”

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The first person to submit the entire correct answer to [email protected] will win a free OpenSecrets.org bumper sticker. The answers can be found somewhere on our website. Happy searching!

In our last Politiquizz, we asked:

Lobbying firms – both their employees and PACs – make contributions to politicians in addition to lobbying them. Of these firms, one firm has remained as one of the top three contributing firms since OpenSecrets’ data started tracking these contributions in the 1990 election cycle. Which group has remained as one of the top three contributors since 1990, and how much more did the firm (employees and PAC) contribute in the 2012 election cycle as compared to the 1990 election cycle?

Congratulations to Carolyn Bobb of Washington, D.C., who was the first to submit a correct answer: WPP Group and $2,007,239.



Image: Rep. John Sarbanes (Flickr/Fort Meade)



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