Wealthy get their money’s worth from Missouri politicians

by J Scott Christianson, Columbia Daily Tribune Columnist

After the reinstatement of limits on political campaign contributions last year, Missouri’s über donor, Rex Sinquefield, started more than 100 PACs so he could easily direct his money to the officeholders of his choice. This provided a legal means to skirt contribution limits and direct hundreds of thousands of dollars to his favorite candidates and officeholders, but it also made it easier to track where his large contributions were going.

The Missouri Citizens Education Fund, an outgrowth of the Missouri Progressive Vote Coalition, has analyzed whether Sinquefield’s investment in political campaigns has translated into votes in the state legislature. For the purposes of their study, they tracked two of Sinquefield’s pet issues: allowing unlimited campaign contributions, and directing tax dollars to fund private schools (aka vouchers).

The voting records show that 86 percent of Missouri House members who received money from Sinquefield voted in favor of allowing unlimited campaign contribution limits and 79 percent of members who received Sinquefield money voted in favor of channeling public money to private schools. It is probably impossible to prove Sinquefield’s donations directly caused legislators to vote a certain way; all this study shows is a strong correlation between campaign contributions and votes, not necessarily a causal relationship. However, one can be certain that legislators who vote as…