Wine and Money
As a follow up to a post on the total amount of campaign contributions alcohol wholesalers and distributors gave to Illinois State politicians in 2008, below is a list of TOTAL STATE CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS BY ALCOHOL WHOLESALERS AND DISTRIBUTORS BY STATE.
Factors such as the state of the economy reduced the amount given from the last election cycle. These figures come from www.followthemoney.org. The total is $8,594,204. Sixty-four percent of this total is attributable to contributions in CA, FL, IL, MI and TX alone. These amounts do not include the money wholesalers and distributors spent on lobbying, which amounts to millions more.
AL 35,500
AK 900
AZ 99,358
AR 17,070
CA 1,011,156
CO 6,400
CT ?
DE 33,050
FL 789,246
GA 381,831
HA ?
ID 16,800
IL 1,588,484
IN 282,462
IA 84,425
KS 63,749
KY 58,350
LA 5,000
ME 554,805
MD 14,450
MA 86,450
MI 523,073
MN 31,650
MS ?
MO 56,130
MT 5,450
NE 10,571
NV 130,838
NH 31,000
NJ 388,863
NM 41,151
NY 225,401
NC 147,298
ND 8,840
OH 283,650
OK 9,075
OR 299,983
PA 105,275
RI 32,450
SC 126,675
SD 1,900
TN 291,443
TX 1,557,606
UT 34,150
VT 3,800
VA ?
WA 107,046
WV 45,300
WI 136,484
WY ?
On the state VA, check this article in 2003 about then exGovernor, now US Senator, Mark Warner, viticulturist who was selling cabernet franc grapes at that time. The first link is to a press article about his operation six years ago.
http://www.inmunited.com/mel/news/2003/030403kluge.html
This is his website in the senate
http://warner.senate.gov/public/
If the figure from Maine is accurate, it’s astonishing. Maine’s population is tiny, but the listed expenditure is near the top.
The Maine figure appears to be money donated for a ballot measure to stop beverage taxes on malt liquor, wine and soft drinks. Yes, that appears to be the amount contributed by the wholesalers (about 15% of the ballot’s total $3,656,584), but seems that they were actually lobbying for something you would agree with. So I guess not all their money is bad.
The money here in MI — already one of the top numbers — is compounded by the fact that we didn’t even have Gubernatorial or State Senate elections during the last cycle. This is JUST the House.
Any wonder why they defeated retailer shipping last year?