— by Sarah Bryner and Doug Weber, Sept. 26, 2013

Introduction

In 1989, a gallon of gas cost 97 cents. The USSR was still a formidable world power, Germany was not yet a united country, and Madonna's Like a Prayer was one of the most popular pop songs of the year. And, in the lead-up to the 1990 elections, 31 women were serving in Congress.

How much things change, and yet, how much they stay the same.

The 2012 congressional elections saw a record number of women elected to both the House and Senate. And even though most of his large campaign donations came from men, Barack Obama relied more heavily on female campaign contributors than any general election presidential candidate since at least 1988.

But many patterns have remained remarkably consistent. In the 1990 campaign cycle, 22 percent of all itemized federal contributions came from women. So far in this election cycle, 25 percent of all contributions have come from women. This 3 percent increase, substantially smaller than the increases seen in the numbers of female elected officials, is one telling component in a much more complex story about how women campaign donations by women have changed over time.

In this special report, we'll detail trends in contributions to women candidates, and from women donors. Some takeaways:

As candidates, female Democrats rely most heavily (and male Republicans, the least) on the support of female contributors. That's been the case since 1990.

Of the top 100 contributors in 2012, 11 were women; that's down from the 21 who fell into that elite group of donors in 1990.

As politics has become more polarized, so too have the patterns of donations from women. They donate more consistently to congressional Democrats. But women who have outside employment (as compared to homemakers) have moved to the left, while those who self-identify as homemakers have moved to the right.

Even though women are more evenly represented in Congress than ever before, the "donor gap" between men and women is still real, and remarkably steady.

Women as Candidates

The number of high-profile female politicians continues to creep up. But, in the 30 years that Opensecrets.org has been monitoring campaign finance and elections, the political landscape for female candidates hasn't shifted as much as one might guess.

Certainly, there are more women in Congress than there were in 1990. Then, 7 percent of all winning House candidates were women. By 2012, nearly 18 percent of victorious House candidates were women. Although this may seem like a major increase, not all candidates win at the same rate. There are more Democratic female candidates and more winners, whereas the number of Republican female candidates, as well as the number of winners, has stayed static. In fact, the 2012 congressional elections led to a decrease in the number of House Republican women -- 20 GOP women won, down from an all-time high of 23 in 2008. Even since the election, one of those women (JoAnn Emerson, a Missouri Republican) left office and was replaced by a man (Jason Smith).

CHART: Women Winners, House

The parties have not always been so dissimilar in this area. In 1990, 10 percent of the Democrats' general election House candidates were women (38), compared to 7 percent of Republican general election House candidates (28). However, in 2012, the Democrats fielded 116 female candidates (28 percent of the party's candidate pool) while the Republicans ran only 48 women candidates (11 percent of their pool). As candidates, female Democrats seem to be slightly more likely to win their contests than female Republicans -- about 50 percent of female Democrats won in 2012, compared to 41 percent of female Republicans (although many other factors contribute to election success).

Generally, some candidates are more likely than others to receive money from women donors. Female Democrats receive the highest proportion of their money from women, and Republican men receive the lowest. This trend can be seen just by scanning the list of the members of the 113th Congress who received the highest proportion of their money from women. Of the top 10 members from each chamber, only one, Bernie Sanders, is not a female Democrat. Similarly, of the members who received the lowest percentage of their money from female donors, only three -- Ed Markey, Gene Green, and Mark Pryor -- are not Republican men. The sitting member who received the least amount of money from women is Rep. Howard Coble (R-NC), who took in only 9.5 percent of his total itemized contributions from women.

TABLE: Highest Percent of Campaign Donations from Women

SENATE Member Total Gender Coded Total from Women % from Women Barbara Boxer (D-Calif) $13,276,020 $6,038,125 45.5% Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis) $5,964,690 $2,698,952 45.3% Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) $5,409,839 $2,424,931 44.8% Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass) $17,411,227 $7,620,482 43.7% Claire McCaskill (D-Mo) $11,744,749 $4,806,138 40.9% Kay R. Hagan (D-NC) $6,022,187 $2,456,329 40.8% Bernie Sanders (I-Vt) $1,529,820 $613,037 40.1% Patty Murray (D-Wash) $7,669,896 $3,060,847 39.9% Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn) $4,685,421 $1,864,037 39.8% Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) $2,613,188 $1,018,469 39%

HOUSE Member Total Gender Coded Total from Women % from Women Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill) $686,044 $445,900 65% Julia Brownley (D-Calif) $1,077,108 $550,872 51.1% Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) $533,925 $271,320 50.8% Jackie Speier (D-Calif) $443,479 $222,724 50.2% Donna Edwards (D-Md) $241,234 $118,100 49% Betty McCollum (D-Minn) $253,436 $122,677 48.4% Lois Capps (D-Calif) $1,472,863 $709,951 48.2% Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH) $587,046 $280,634 47.8% Ann Mclane Kuster (D-NH) $1,524,411 $717,314 47.1% Robin Kelly (D-Ill) $222,405 $103,150 46.4%

TABLE: Lowest Percent of Campaign Donations from Women

SENATE Member Total Gender Coded Total from Women % from Women Thad Cochran (R-Miss) $1,172,839 $145,731 12.4% David Vitter (R-La) $6,349,395 $1,023,163 16.1% Ed Markey (D-Mass) $446,615 $75,250 16.9% James M. Inhofe (R-Okla) $3,183,135 $541,424 17% Tom Coburn (R-Okla) $1,016,514 $184,675 18.1% Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) $1,495,767 $274,855 18.4% Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala) $3,618,554 $669,783 18.5% Mark Pryor (D-Ark) $2,683,647 $499,419 18.6% Lindsey Graham (R-SC) $4,414,776 $922,692 20.9% John A. Barrasso (R-Wyo) $2,985,542 $632,689 21.2%

HOUSE Member Total Gender Coded Total from Women % from Women Howard Coble (R-NC) $118,275 $11,240 9.5% Steve Scalise (R-La) $676,295 $69,150 10.2% Mike D. Rogers (R-Ala) $431,035 $44,535 10.3% Gene Green (D-Texas) $150,550 $16,450 10.9% Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) $282,333 $33,030 11.7% Tom Cole (R-Okla) $455,181 $54,300 11.9% Chris Collins (R-NY) $393,910 $51,900 13.2% Frank D. Lucas (R-Okla) $408,694 $54,000 13.2% Adrian Smith (R-Neb) $332,086 $44,242 13.3% Rob Bishop (R-Utah) $102,404 $13,650 13.3%

Of course, just receiving more or less money from women does not mean that the lawmakers are likely to behave any differently from each other once elected, nor does it mean that those members are receiving less money from women for any specific reason. However, access is often granted to deep-pocketed campaign donors, and if those campaign donors are predominantly male (or female), this may be an indication that the politician is more likely to grant access to men.

Women as Contributors

Women are actually slightly better represented among large campaign donors than they are among members of Congress, but not among the very deep-pocketed donors. In 2012, women contributed just under 30 percent of all of the money given that cycle, but they only contributed 19 percent of all money to outside spending groups, which are allowed to receive unlimited contributions. And, if we remove contributions by the top woman donor (Miriam Adelson) from the list, women contributed only 11 percent of all money to outside groups. In fact, women tended to give, per capita, smaller donations than did male contributors. Of the 100 most generous campaign contributors in 2012, only 11 were women.

Looking only at the amount of money coming from women can be deceptive. The candidates who get the most money, as a percentage, from women are almost entirely female Democrats, but the average female contributor is not necessarily donating to female Democrats. Fewer Republican women run for Congress, and so -- naturally -- more money tends to flow from women to Democratic women, compared to Republican women.

However, as a proportion of the overall amount of money given, women only marginally tend to prefer Democratic candidates. In fact, in 1996, women favored Republican congressional candidates. Substantially more money was delivered from women to George W. Bush than to Al Gore in 2000, although Bush refused matching funds and had no limit on his primary fundraising, leading him to receive much more money than Gore.

Barack Obama, however, received 70 percent more campaign money from women than did John McCain in the 2008 presidential contest. In 2012, Obama was also more dependent on female contributors than any general election presidential candidate since 1990. More than 44 percent of his itemized campaign money came from women, while only 28 percent of Mitt Romney's money was provided by women.

TABLE: Contributions to Federal Candidates from Women

Cycle Amount from Women to Candidates Amount from Women to Democrats % from Women to Democrats 1990 $36,337,893 $18,870,404 51.9% 1992 $55,960,955 $33,003,714 59% 1994 $64,321,090 $32,931,025 51.2% 1996 $77,716,390 $37,379,474 48.1% 1998 $77,960,548 $40,314,856 51.7% 2000 $109,592,551 $57,215,459 52.2% 2002 $113,102,129 $62,241,691 55% 2004 $149,905,777 $80,788,620 53.9% 2006 $189,249,525 $108,892,727 57.5% 2008 $181,868,319 $106,516,624 58.6% 2010 $222,570,178 $117,140,308 52.6% 2012 $231,810,103 $120,895,903 52.2% 2014 $33,800,926 $18,981,166 56.2%

Women are not a monolith, of course. They represent different interests and industries, and come from different backgrounds. In 1990, homemakers donated similarly to women who work outside the home, based on party preferences. In fact, homemakers were very slightly more likely to support Democrats in 1990 than were women who reported outside employment. That reversed itself and the gap has widened since 1990, and in 2012, 56 percent of the donations from women who reported outside employment went to Democrats, compared to 37 percent of the donations from women who self-identified as homemakers.

TABLE: Employed Women vs. Homemaker Contributions

Cycle Employed Women

% to Dems Female Homemakers

% to Dems Difference between

% to Democrats 1990 42% 42% 0% 1992 57% 45% 12% 1994 52% 43% 9% 1996 49% 35% 14% 1998 54% 40% 14% 2000 50% 38% 12% 2002 54% 44% 10% 2004 59% 44% 15% 2006 59% 44% 15% 2008 66% 57% 9% 2010 60% 45% 15% 2012 56% 37% 19% 2014 62% 42% 20%

The overall number of homemakers, as a proportion of overall donations, is still a small share of the overall pool, with these women only contributing between 7 percent and 9 percent of all money since 1990. From this data, it appears that even though a similar proportion of the overall pool is composed of homemakers, those homemakers are becoming more conservative, or the women who enter the workforce are becoming more liberal.

Just as not all women have outside employment, not all women who have outside employment are in the same kinds of jobs. Women report employers from many different industries, but substantial variation exists in how large a share of these industries' contributions come from women. For example, only 16 percent of contributions from the defense sector came from women in 2012. More than 43 percent of contributions from the "ideological" sector came from women.

These numbers do not necessarily suggest that fewer women work in the defense sector than in the ideological sector. What they do suggest is that candidates who receive substantial amounts of money from the defense sector are less likely to receive money from women.

Certain industries are also more likely to see more money flowing from female donors to federal candidates. So far this cycle, more than 63 percent of all money from the nonprofit sector has come from women. Other industries that tend to see a larger percentage of their contributions from women include miscellaneous services, education, and religious institutions. Those industries that lean more on men making contributions include casinos and gambling, defense aerospace, special trade contractors, and mining.

Limits & Legal Reform

In the last 24 years, there have been dramatic shifts in the ways individuals can donate money. Until 2002, individuals could give essentially unlimited amounts of money to political parties, which could then distribute those funds to state parties and candidates which could spend that money on issue ads that were permitted to mention federal candidates. This "soft money" system allowed individuals to circumvent contribution limits.

In 2002, Congress passed the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, which banned unlimited soft money. But in 2009, legal developments allowed individuals (and organizations) to begin donating unlimited sums of money to "independent expenditure only" committees. These committees provided deep-pocketed individuals with the opportunity to spend large amounts of money again.

What do these legal changes have to do with women's donation habits? Women tend to make up a larger percentage of the donor pool when contribution amounts are limited by law -- although the overall percentage of women donating tends to be no higher than 35 percent. In the 2004, 2006 and 2008 cycles, which were the only three since 1990 with strict donation limits restricting the amount of money a single individual could give, the percentage of women as a portion of the donor pool increased.

Breaking out the percentage of women donating to the various types of political recipients reveals some other trends. Women tend to be a larger portion of the donor pool to presidential candidates, and a smaller proportion of the donors to PACs. After 2002, when soft money donations to parties were banned, the proportion of money contributed to the parties by women, compared to men, increased. These trends suggest that when campaign limits are enforced and effective, women tend to make up a larger share of the donor pool.

The Polarization of Women Donors

More women are giving more money to politicians and parties now than they were 20 years ago, and Democrats are growing increasingly dependent on their support. This map shows counties where women have given at least $25,000 in an election cycle. Darker-colored counties are those where contributions to candidates are most polarized, by party.

Women Donors Drift to Left

Men Still Rule in Political Donations

Methodological Notes

Importantly, this study examines only contributions from individuals who donated at least $200 to an individual candidate, party, PAC, or super PAC. Individuals making contributions of less than that amount are not included in the Federal Election Commission's downloadable file, and are therefore not included in our analysis. There is no reason to believe that individuals who donate more than $200 are a representative sample of all Americans, or even a representative sample of all Americans who donate to federal campaigns. However, these large contributions consistently come to more than 60 percent of the total money received by campaigns, so the impact of individuals who make these contributions is magnified.

How do we identify contributor's sex?

We use an algorithm developed by MelissaData (and available here) to decompose a contributor's name into Firstname, Lastname, Prefix, Suffix, and Sex. The software recognizes contextual clues (including identifiers like "Mrs." or "Mr.") as well as known sexes for names like John and Mary to sort names into one of four categories: male, female, unknown, or ambiguous. OpenSecrets.org staff members reconcile any conflicting sexes for individual contributors, and manually identify sex for some of the largest contributors.

Graphics by Anna Flagg

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: info[at]crp.org