Politics

Who's Bankrolling the Super Committee: Senate Republicans

The financial backers of the newly-appointed committee members

By John Hudson
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Today, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell announced the GOP senators who will serve on the 12-member Super Committee tasked with cutting $1.5 trillion in federal spending. The appointments include Sens. Jon Kyl, Pat Toomey, and Rob Portman. As we noted earlier today, when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced his selection of Senate Democrats, the panel will be under intense pressure from lobbyists and special interest groups. As such, it's nice to know what corporations and advocacy groups have been filling their campaign war chests over the years.

Pat Toomey The top industries that have given to the Pennsylvania Republican come from securities and investment, the retired, and business services, according to the non-partisan government transparency group, the Sunlight Foundation. The top contributor to Toomey is the anti-tax group Club for Growth by a landslide ($837,641) followed by Elliot Management, the Senate Conservatives Fund and the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Rob Portman Some of the top contributors to this Ohio Republican include Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, American Financial Group, JPMorgan Chase, Procter & Gamble and Metlife. If that sounds like quite the mix of lawyers and investment firms, you'd be correct. As the Sunlight Foundation's industry donor breakdown notes, those industries line up right behind donations coming in from retired people.

Jon Kyl The Sunlight Foundation doesn't have a record on this Arizona Republican but his campaign financing details are available on OpenSecrets.org, run by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics. According to the group, Kyl's biggest sugar daddy from 2007 to now is the bank Citigroup, with major assists from companies and employees in the pharmaceuticals industry, hospitals, securities and investments, and food and beverage.

Stay tuned for our complete list of financial backers of the super committee members:

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.