September 30, 2010 | Read Time: 1 minute
Curious about the political leanings of your favorite philanthropist? The Huffington Post now offers a tool that can help you find out.
On HuffPost FundRace, you can punch in a name and find out whether the person has made any donations to a political candidate, party, or committee since 2004. A map will even pop up to take you directly to the person’s address.
We tried out a few names and can offer the following intelligence:
Eli Broad, head of the Los Angeles foundation that bears his name, apparently wants Democrats to keep control of Congress. He donated $30,000 to the Democratic Congressional Committee in 2009.
Bill Gates donated to both Democratic and Republican members of Congress in 2009 and 2010, including Jay Inslee, Democrat of Washington; Mike Pence, Republican of Indiana; Pete Sessions, Republican of Texas; and Dave Reichert, Republican of Washington.
Pamela and Pierre Omidyar, founders of the Omidyar Network, spread their wealth to Democrats in the 2008 elections. They each gave money to Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker; and Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader. Pamela Omidyar also donated to presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
The HuffPost tool, which draws from public records filed with the Federal Election Commission, also allows you to scan political donations by a donor’s employer.
It picked up $69,792 in donations since 2004 by people who listed their employer as the American Red Cross. All but about $15,000 went to Democrats. American Cancer Society employees gave $46,895 during that period, favoring Democrats by an even larger margin (they got all but $1,500).
An investigation by The Chronicle of campaign donations by employees of large nonprofits and foundations in the 2008 presidential campaign found a definite preference for Democrats. They gave 12 times as much to Barack Obama as to his Republican competitor, John McCain.
