Summary of the variables

Sortable Table

In the table below, we can see every contribution made by a local resident to a committee with an affiliation to a political party from January of 2015 through the end of August, 2019.

Summary Table

We can group the donations by year and party to get a bigger picture view of the average contribution amount, the total number of contributors (by household), and the total amount raised by each political party. In the table below, we can see the total number of individuals who contributed to entities each year and the average donation broken down by party.

Annual trends in contributions by Party

We can group all contributions by both year and party to see if any trends are apparent. In doing so, we can quickly recognize that total donations are nearly twice as high in elections years (2016 and 2018) than in off years (2015, 2017, and 2019). The recipient of the contributions are color coded by party. The smaller parties barely register, showing how dominant the two major parties are politically. We can see that contributions to the Democratic Party increased as a proportion of the total contributions significantly in 2018. We can surmise that Democratic enthusiasm locally was up in 2018 and the national election results mirrored this enthusiasm, with the Democrats adding 41 seats in the House of Representatives, their biggest gain in any election in well over 40 years.

Democratic gains in 2018 Cycle

While we can eyeball the relative gains in fundraising made by the Democratic Party from Cincinnati contributors in 2018, it is hard to tell just how substantial those gains were. By combining contributions from to reflect the 2016 election cycle (2015 and 2016) and the 2018 cycle (2017 and 2018), we can quantify just how much the Democratic Party was able to close the gap. The Republicans had a huge advantage in the 2016 cycle, racking up $767,667 more in contributions from Cincinnati residents. The Democrats nearly erased the gap and were only at a deficit of $84,050 in the 2018 cycle. The Democratic Party reduced 89% of the financial gap compared to the previous two-year cycle

Association between amount contributed and committee type

We can break down contributions by committee type to get a better idea of how much money each rose overall. Very little of the local contributions went to PACs. By far the biggest total dollar amounts were given to the parties themselves.

We can also look at the average contribution made to each of the committee types. We can see clearly that average donations were much smaller to Presidential fundraising committees. This likely reflects the increased interest the top of the ticket generates and the expanded pool of donors interested in supporting presidential candidates.

Most frequent contributors

While we can have determined which local individuals contributed the most money, we may also want to investigate which have given the most often. The following table shows the total number of contributions over the time period between 2015 and late 2019.

Ann Ruchoft made an astounding number of contributions over this time period. We can take a closer look at just her contributions:

We see the number was even higher than previously indicated because 15 of her 1,305 contributions were recorded under the first name Anna instead of Ann.

It is unclear exactly why so many donations were made and nothing in the above table sheds a lot of light on the mystery. Given how many of the small donations were repeated soon after, it may be that the committees requested that Ms. Ruchoft split her donations up. In politics, it is often viewed as beneficial for politicians to show as much of their total fundraising haul as coming from small donations (often defined as $25 or less) as possible. The reasoning for this is twofold. First, having many small fundraisers in sometimes touted in the media and by the candidates themselves as an indication of grassroots support and enthusiasm. Second, there is a school of thought that candidates raking in a lot of big donations and fewer small donations will be more beholden to their deep-pocketed donors than would candidates whose fundraising is coming in the form of smaller dcontributions.

Ms. Ruchoft and the others with a high number of contributions may be deep pocketed donors masquerading as smaller donors to juice the number of donations and decrease the average amount of their preferred committees donations for the sake of perception. Or it could be a much more mundane explanation. Perhaps these donors just fire off a small donation every time they see something frustrating about the opposing party (or inspiring from their preferred candidates).

Most Heavily Represented Employers

By grouping contributions amounts by the employer of the individual contributing, we can gain some insight into which local companies potentially wield the most political influence. American Financial Group tops the list but we see that two related entities, Castellini Company and Castellini Management Company, when grouped together have actually contributed the most money.

For those worried about the influence of money in politics, this is a clear example of a situation where we should have some concern. Castellini’s ownership group receives a significant amount of public money due to a 1996 agreement with Hamilton County that funded a portion of the construction for the Reds new stadium. From that agreement (which included a half-cent rise increase in sales tax), the Reds receive an annual payment from the County to pay for debt on the stadiums and repair costs. Elected officials have a great deal of influence over how much of this money the local pro sports team receive each year compared to how much is “rolled back” to taxpayers. There is a clear conflict of interest for politicians receiving big donations from Castellini and his associates when it comes to deciding how much public money to dole out.

Xavier University Employee Contributions

Xavier University employees contributed a total of $11,224 to committees affiliated with a political party over this time frame. This pales in comparison to the amount contributed by University of Cincinnati employees ($162,019, as seen above in the table showing the local employers whose employees gave the most). This is likely mostly due to the large difference in the number of employees between the two universities but may also reflect the fact that the public university is more reliant on public funding.

Below, we can see the total amount donated by individual Xavier University employee, led by Ann Tracey, who contributed $1,750 over this time period.

Refunds

Refunds of political contributions are an interesting phenomenon worth exploring to see if there are any trends as to which entities were most likely to give refunds. We can see in the bar chart below that committees tied to the parties themselves were least likely to give refunds. This would make sense from the standpoint that the parties are not going anywhere, whereas the candidates might. We see an especially high number of refunds from Senatorial fundraising committees.

Contributions by Month in 2018

Viewing donations by month in an election year would be interesting, both in terms of the totals and whether either party does comparatively better at a particular time of year. We will look at monthly donations, by party, in the year 2018 to see if any trends stand out. We can see in the bar chart below that it took a while for fundraising to kick into gear, with the totals peaking for both parties in the months immediately prior to the November election. After the election, contributions fell to almost zero in December.

Committees affiliated with Democratic Party brought in more money in every month prior to the election in 2018, though committees affiliated with the Republican Party did close the gap somewhat in the immediate runup to the election.