Maplight.org - Exposing the Money Trail

The business of politics is notoriously known for being less than transparent; however, Maplight, makes the connections between money and votes clear for the world to see. The site exposes correlations between special interest funds and legislative voting; previously, access to this kind of information was privy, however web technology and public databases have now exposed how money influences votes in Washington. Maplight analyzes sets of data to achieve its goal: bill texts and legislative voting records, supporting and opposing interests for each bill, and campaign contribution data from the Center for Responsive Politics and the National Institute on Money in State Politics. By combining this data Maplight traces what groups donated to which causes, average donations to senators voting yes and no to a bill, and the site also provides a timeline of contributions and votes for a bill. Maplight originally focused on California´s political scene, but now the site has collected data from all states. Maplight is a non-profit organization and counts on public donations to keep it running.

“MAPLight.org, a groundbreaking public database, illuminates the connection between campaign donations and legislative votes in unprecedented ways. Elected officials collect large sums of money to run their campaigns, and they often pay back campaign contributors with special access and favorable laws.

Political affairs are renowned for secrecy and unfortunately corruption. Maplight provides a means for ordinary citizens to find out what´s really going on; it´s definitely something that needs to be done.

Are they really non-partisan? There´s tons of data to sift through, how are they going to keep it up by just relying on donations?