During 2009 and 2010, labor unions reported spending a combined $46.7 million on messaging designed to aide their preferred federal political candidates, according to an analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics. Those candidates were overwhelmingly Democrats.

This figure represents 16 percent of all such spending by non-party committees — the lowest amount in years, according to the Center’s research.

By contrast, the four biggest-spending conservative groups together accounted for about $1 of every $3 spent on these types of political advertisements.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Action Network, American Crossroads and Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies reported spending a combined $97.6 million during the 2010 election cycle.

This decline comes as unions across the country are feeling the heat from GOP leaders, especially in Wisconsin, where newly elected Republican Gov. Scott Walker is trying to remove public employee unions’ collective bargaining rights, Democratic state senators have fled the state to block the controversial legislation and tens of thousands of protesters have descended upon the state capital.

The graph below (click on it to enlarge) shows the spending levels of these four high-profile conservative groups, as well as the top-spending unions and all labor unions combined:

American Crossroads, Crossroads GPS and American Action Network were all launched last year. And they hope to continue to have a significant effect on future elections.

American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, for instance, intend to raise a whopping $120 million for the 2012 election cycle, as OpenSecrets Blog reported Tuesday.

The rise of these deep-pocketed conservative groups, furthermore, has been aided by well-connected political hands.

Karl Rove, President George W. Bush’s former adviser, and former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie helped birth American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS.

Steven Law, the head of these two groups, is the former general counsel at the Chamber of Commerce and former chief of staff to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

And American Action Network is headed by former Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) and shares office space with the two Rove-backed Crossroads groups.

As a so-called 527 organization-turned-super PAC, American Crossroads discloses information about its donors to the Federal Election Commission.

Both Crossroads GPS and American Action Network, however, are organized under section 501(c)4 of U.S. tax code as nonprofit organizations, and thus, they that are not required to disclose any information about their donors. The Chamber of Commerce, too, is not required to disclose information about its donors.

By the Center’s calculations, liberal groups, conservative outfits and nonpartisan political action committees spent a combined $297 million on advertisements and other communications lauding their preferred candidates, attacking politicians they disagreed with and touting their pet issues. Legally known as independent expenditures, electioneering communications and communication costs, these expenses were regularly reported to the FEC during the 2010 election cycle.

Independent expenditures and electioneering communications — which constituted the vast of majority of these expenditures — cannot be coordinated with candidates’ own campaigns or with party committees such as the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee or National Republican Senatorial Committee.

During the 2006 election cycle, when Democrats wrested control of both houses of Congress away from Republicans, unions spent $21.6 million on independent expenditures, electioneering communications and other communication costs — about 31.5 percent of all such expenditures by outside groups.

That cycle was a relative peak for such union spending.

During the 2008 election cycle, labor unions spent nearly $86 million on these types of political expenditures — a figure that represented 28.5 percent of all such spending. And during the 2004 election cycle, labor unions spent $48.7 million — about 24 percent of all such expenditures by outside groups.

Unions can also spend money on other activities that are not reported to the FEC but that may help get out the vote, such as grassroots lobbying, some member-to-member communications and issue ads.

Many unions also operate political action committees that donate directly to candidates. During the 2010 election cycle, labor PACs contributed $69 million to federal candidates and committees, with 93 percent of those funds benefiting Democrats, according to the Center’s research.

Center for Responsive Politics researcher Spencer MacColl contributed to this report.



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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