Washington State Campaign Finance Summary By Election Year

Washington State data summarizes candidate campaign and political committee financial activity by election year, compiled from official campaign reports and registrations. Records cover the prior 16 years plus the current election year and are updated in near real-time, typically within 2 minutes of submission. The Washington State Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) produces this data from reports filed with the Secretary of State.

Use Cases

• Analyze contributions_amount and loans_amount by party and jurisdiction_type to model campaign funding sources.
• Track independent_expenditures_for_amount and independent_expenditures_against_amount by ballot_proposal_count to measure outside spending on ballot initiatives.
• Examine carryforward_amount and election_status to assess financial resources available to candidates across election cycles.
• Map treasurer_city and treasurer_state distributions to identify geographic concentrations of campaign treasurers.
• Correlate pac_type with independent_expenditures_against_amount to study political action committee spending patterns.

Strengths

• Covers 16 years of historical data plus the current election year
• Updated in near real-time, typically within 2 minutes of data submission
• Compiled from multiple official sources including C3, C4, and C1/C1pc reports

Limitations

• Commercial use of the data is prohibited by Washington state law
• Sample data and total row count are unavailable for assessing volume
• Legal definitions require consulting external statutes RCW 42.17A and WAC Title 390

Provenance

Source

Washington State Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) via data.wa.gov

Collection Method

Compiled from campaign reports deposit (C3), campaign summary reports (C4), campaign registrations (C1/C1pc), and candidate declarations/elections data from the Secretary of State

Time Range

Prior 16 years plus the current election year

Freshness

Updated in near real-time, typically less than 2 minutes from submission

Geography

Washington State, United States