Obama inaugural fund a study in transparency

Barack Obama greeted well-wishers after working out at the gym at Marine Corps Base Hawaii at Kaneohe Bay in Kailua, Hawaii, on Wednesday. He was there for the Christmas holiday. (Joaquin Siopack-Pool/Getty Images)

To win the election, Barack Obama's campaign raised unprecedented amounts from supporters who gave only a few dollars or so, but his Presidential Inaugural Committee thus far is raising money mostly the old-fashioned way - one big check at a time.

With less than three weeks until the inauguration, the committee had collected at least $24.3 million toward its goal of $40 million, and 87 percent of that amount is from individual donors who gave either $25,000 or $50,000, according to a Globe analysis of donations listed on the committee's website. The list is studded with captains of commerce and entertainment moguls and stars, including Steven Spielberg and Jamie Foxx.

The campaign has touted "unprecedented standards of transparency in the public reporting of donors to a presidential inaugural committee," including a self-imposed limit of $50,000 per donor and a ban on contributions from corporations, labor unions, lobbyists, or political action committees.

But the list is laden with leaders of technology, finance, and real estate development, including Google chief executive Eric Schmidt and five of his lieutenants, who each gave $25,000; and global financier George Soros and four family members, $50,000 apiece.

The information is available quickly: donations of $200 or more are posted on the website within 48 hours and identify the donors' employers. The committee site also lists the identity of so-called bundlers, fund-raising operatives who solicit donations on behalf of the committee but with a self-imposed cap of $300,000 per bundler.

As of Wednesday, the committee had posted a total of 1,035 donations of $200 or more on its website. Of the total, 323 were for $50,000, for a total of $16.15 million; 196 were for $25,000, for a total of $4.9 million; and 88 others were for other amounts over $10,000, for a total of $1.1 million.

"We set these limits on ourselves and have been very aggressive in making sure this information is out there, so people can see who's contributing to the cost of the official inaugural events," said Brent Colburn, a spokesman for the Obama inaugural committee.

The $24.3 million figure does not include contributions of less than $200, and the committee could not say how many small-dollar donations it had received or the total amount. Colburn, however, said the committee "has not been as aggressive on our grassroots fund-raising level, but I think you will see that change in the new year."

Four years ago, President Bush's second inaugural committee collected $42.3 million from about 15,000 donors, including dozens of corporations that gave up to $250,000, the limit set by the committee. The Bush inaugural committee also received thousands of small-dollar donations, including several hundred contributions for $1.

There are few legal restrictions on fund-raising to pay for the balls, parties, the parade, and other official celebratory events in Washington that accompany the more solemn proceeding of swearing in the new president at the Capitol.

"Because donations to an inaugural committee are not contributions under the law, there is no statutory limit on them and no source prohibition, except that foreign nationals are prohibited from donating to inaugural committees," said Bob Biersack, a spokesman for the Federal Election Commission.

The Obama report lists three $50,000 donations from outside the United States, one each from individuals in China, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Colburn said all three are American citizens living overseas and the contributions are therefore legal.

There is also a single domestic contribution of $100,000 reported. Colburn said the committee double-checked and found the entry mistakenly combined two checks of $50,000 from a husband and wife and the website will be corrected to reflect that.

While the inauguration committee has banned contributions from corporations, it reported receiving a $50,000 donation from the Cherokee Nation Businesses LLC of Catoosa, Okla., which owns a variety of businesses, including casinos, and describes itself as the 14th-largest employer in Oklahoma. Colburn said the committee does not treat Indian tribes as business entities, but, like the Obama campaign, subjects them to the limits imposed on individual contributors.

Obama's campaign has gone further than President Bush's in its disclosure and limits on contributions, but the Bush committee went also beyond the legal requirements, not only in setting a $250,000 contribution limit, but also in periodically disclosing the identity of donors on its official website before the inauguration.

By law, inaugural committees are not required to file a report of their contributors with the FEC until 90 days after the inaugural.

In addition to the privately raised funds to pay for the festivities, which in the case of the Obama inaugural includes 10 inaugural balls and a pre-inaugural welcoming ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial, government funds are used to pay for security-related expenses. In 1997, the government contribution was about $11.7 million for President Bill Clinton's second inauguration, and by 2005, it had soared to $17 million for the second Bush inaugural.

As of Wednesday, the committee had raised the largest share of its funds from a handful of states: California, 212 contributions totaling $5.3 million; New York, 139 for $3.5 million; Obama's home state of Illinois, 105 donations for $2.3 million; Florida, 139 donations for $3.5 million; and the District of Columbia and neighboring Virginia and Maryland, a combined 174 donations for $2.4 million.

There were zero contributions of $200 or more from seven states - Alaska, Delaware, Idaho, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, and Utah. Six states produced a single contribution - Arkansas, Hawaii, Iowa, New Hampshire, South Dakota, and West Virginia.

Among other New England states, Massachusetts led with 30 contributions totaling $711,000; followed by Connecticut, 20 for a combined $509,450; Vermont, five for a total of $150,250; Rhode Island, four for a combined $101,250; and Maine, two for a total of $75,000.