Deprecation Notice
The advanced search feature, as well as the Influence Explorer API are approaching end of life, and will be retired on December 31st, 2015. Please refer to our deprecation notice for more details.
Documentation
- Overview
- Campaign Finance
- Campaign Finance (DC)
- Federal Lobbying
- Federal Grants
- Federal Contracts
- Foreign Influence
- Earmarks
- EPA ECHO
- Data Changelog
Campaign Contributions Data Schema
- cycle
- The election cycle in which the transaction occurred. Valid values are even years between 1990 and 2010 (inclusive).
- transaction_namespace
Indicates the source of the transaction.
Value Description urn:fec:transaction federal transactions (CRP) urn:nimsp:transaction state transactions (NIMSP) - transaction_id
- Unique record ID given to the transaction by the FEC (federal) or NIMSP (state). Federal records are only guaranteed to be unique per year so they are prepended with the cycle.
- transaction_type
- Federal records have transaction types assigned by the FEC. The transaction type indicates whether the record is, for instance, a contribution, an independent expenditure, a loan or one of many more esoteric types. The interpretation of the remaining columns may depend on the transaction type. A full list of transaction types is available from the FEC. See also the campaign finance methodology page for how transaction types are used in Influence Explorer. State records do not have transaction types.
- transaction_type_description
- A description of the transaction_type code, taken from the FEC descriptions here.
- filing_id
- Unique identifier for the actual filing with the FEC. State records do not yet have filing identifiers.
- is_amendment
- TRUE if transaction is an amendment to a previously reported transaction, otherwise FALSE.
- amount
- Amount of the transaction in US dollars.
- date
- Date of the transaction.
- contributor_name
- Typically indicates the name of the person or organization making the contribution. Exact meaning is dependent on transaction_type. For independent expenditures and electioneering cost this is the name of the committee making the expenditure.
- contributor_ext_id
- The NIMSP or CRP ID of the contributor, if an ID exists.
- contributor_type
- I for individual or C for PAC. NIMSP (state) records do not have a contributor type.
- contributor_occupation
- The self-reported occupation of the contributor.
- contributor_employer
- The self-reported employer of the contributor.
- contributor_gender
- M for male, F for female. Gender will only be found on CRP (federal) records.
- contributor_address
- The self-reported address of the contributor.
- contributor_city
- The self-reported city of the contributor.
- contributor_state
- The self-reported state of the contributor as the two-letter state abbreviation.
- contributor_zipcode
- The self-reported ZIPCode of the contributor.
- contributor_category
- The five character industry category code of the contributor assigned by CRP or NIMSP.
- organization_name
- The name of the organization related to the contributor (employee, owner, spouse of owner, etc.). CRP or NIMSP standardized name.
- organization_ext_id
- The NIMSP or CRP ID of the organization, if an ID exists.
- parent_organization_name
- The name of the parent organization if one exists. CRP or NIMSP standardized name.
- parent_organization_ext_id
- The NIMSP or CRP ID of the parent organization, if an ID exists.
- recipient_name
- Typically indicates the name of the candidate or organization receiving the contribution. For independent expenditures and electioneering cost this is the name of the candidate that was targeted in the spending.
- recipient_ext_id
- The NIMSP or CRP ID of the recipient.
- recipient_party
- The political party to which the recipient belongs. 3 for third party, D for Democratic Party, I for independent, R for Republican Party, and U for unknown.
- recipient_type
- C for committees, O for organizations, P for politicians.
- recipient_category
- The five character industry category code of the recipient assigned by CRP or NIMSP. A full listing of categories and category orders can be found in catcodes.csv.
- recipient_category_order
- The three character industry code of the recipient assigned by CRP or NIMSP. A full listing of categories and category orders can be found in catcodes.csv.
- committee_name
- The name of the committee associated with the recipient of the contribution. This may be a parent committee or the election committee for the candidate.
- committee_ext_id
- The NIMSP or CRP ID of the committee.
- committee_party
- The political party to which the committee belongs. 3 for third party, D for Democratic Party, I for independent, R for Republican Party, and U for unknown.
- candidacy_status
- TRUE for general election, FALSE for lost in the primary or dropped out, NULL if never ran.
- district
- The district that the candidate represents, if there is one. The district is as the state abbreviation followed by the district number. For example: CA-12.
- seat
The type of office being sought by the candidate.
Value Description federal:senate US Senate federal:house US House of Representatives federal:president US President state:upper upper chamber of state legislature state:lower lower chamber of state legislature state:governor state governor - seat_status
- I for incumbent, O for open. The value will be filled in as available in the source data.
- seat_result
- W for win, L for loss. The value will be filled in as available in the source data.