One of the questions we hear most frequently at OpenSecrets.org is “How recent are your numbers?” It’s a question that is significantly harder to answer than one might think — the CRP research department regularly consults a multi-colored spreadsheet with hundreds of rows to track the updates and changes to the various sections of our vast website — but it might be surprising to learn that many of our most popular features update numerous times a day. Here is a list of some (but not all!) of the places that you should expect to see our freshest data:

All Total Raised and Spent information, and cash-on-hand:

We collect basic summary data from the Federal Election Commission every day. On every member, PAC and party profile, as well as all of the election pages, you should be able to see numbers pulled directly from that summary file. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the numbers reflect up-to-the-minute totals about how much the campaign has earned and spent. Political committees file either monthly or quarterly reports, and so the totals reflect the most recently reported figures. But, shortly after a committee submits its filing, you can see that information on OpenSecrets.org.

Again, be aware that when you see a note at the bottom of a page on our site saying that the data is “based on Federal Election Commission data available electronically on Monday, April 07, 2014,” for instance, it does not represent a candidate’s fundraising and spending through April 7, but only through the last reporting deadline (quarterly or monthly).

Most of our Outside Spending information:

Help us keep government accountable by making a donation today.

Are you curious about who is running scary, mysterious TV attack ads in your area? On our homepage, we display a running list of the most recently filed reports on independent expenditures by outside spending groups (think super PACs and politically active nonprofits). We collect information about these reports every three hours and go to great lengths to make sure that the information is displayed quickly and accurately. This information doesn’t exist only on our homepage. The entire Federal Election Spending portion of our Outside Spending section is largely driven by data that’s updated many times a day. On our summary page for outside spending, you can see the candidates and races that are attracting the most outside spending, as well as the groups that have spent the most money. The only part of our outside spending section that is not updated as frequently deals with the top donors and industries supporting the groups; we need a little time to carefully standardize that data, so you’ll have to wait just a bit longer for that.



Most Expensive Races (and least expensive ones, too):



Sometimes, it important to know which races are attracting the most money. With that in mind, we provide daily data about the most expensive races, both with and without outside spending. This way, you can easily determine which races are shaping up to be hotly contested battles, which are potentially setting fundraising records, and which might be attracting large amounts of outside spending.

Much of the information in our 2014 Overview section:

The FEC-provided summary data, while not illuminating any of the industry or individual donor trends our staff carefully explores, does offer users some major takeaways about ongoing elections. We share much of this information in our 2014 Overview section. You can see how much money all House and Senate candidates have raised so far, which candidates have the most cash on hand, who has received the most money from PACs and which candidates are largely bankrolling their own campaigns.

As always, if you have any questions about the work that we do or are interested in learning more about campaign finance, please contact us at [email protected] or, for reporters, [email protected]



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]





Support Accountability Journalism At OpenSecrets.org we offer in-depth, money-in-politics stories in the public interest. Whether you’re reading about 2020 presidential fundraising, conflicts of interest or “dark money” influence, we produce this content with a small, but dedicated team. Every donation we receive from users like you goes directly into promoting high-quality data analysis and investigative journalism that you can trust.Please support our work and keep this resource free. Thank you. Support OpenSecrets ➜