Let me say upfront that I will support our nominee — whether it’s Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) or former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton or someone else. Democrats are very fortunate in that, unlike the GOP, we actually have a pool of very qualified candidates for the 2016 presidential election.
That said, I think we should examine all of our candidates.
Sen. Sanders is running his campaign on the principle of not being financed by big business and big banks; you can expect him to make this a big issue in the primaries?against Hillary. We can expect him to point out (repeatedly) how beholden the Clintons are to the finance sector.
This chart via Reddit user Bombed illustrates precisely who is financing both candidates. The info for the chart comes from OpenSecrets.org.
From Open Secrets:
“The organizations themselves did not donate,” OpenSecrets explains. “Rather the money came from the organizations’ PACs, their individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals’ immediate families.”
Vox points out that out of Hillary Clinton’s top 20 donors, only two aren’t corporate and/or financial sector donors. They include:
- 7 banks
- 5 corporate law/lobbying firms
- 3 huge entertainment companies
Vox explains:
Now, to be fair to Clinton, the vast majority of these donations came from individuals rather than corporate PACs, and as a senator from New York it’s understandable that finance and media interests (not to mention New York ceramics giant Corning) would give to her heavily. But it’s still a very corporate-heavy list.
Bernie Sanders top 20 donors includes 19 unions. The only non-labor donor is the American Association for Justice.
What does this mean for our Democratic primaries? ?They’re going to be interesting.
