Ballot measure backers spend big, win big

Liz Essley Whyte
Updated

Editor’s note: The Center for Public Integrity tracked political advertising in races for the U.S. Senate, state-level offices and state ballot measures. Use these three interactive features to see who was calling the shots and where the money was spent.

Big money was a boon to groups fighting for and against ballot measures across the states on Election Day.

In 21 of the top 25 most expensive state ballot measure races in terms of television ad spending, groups that won the war on the airwaves also won at the ballot box, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of unofficial election results and preliminary data from media tracking service Kantar Media/CMAG.

Related: State ballot measures tracker

But surprising upsets also showed that in the wild world of direct democracy, money isn’t everything.

“The relationship is more complicated than just ‘spending more [means] having greater success.’ There are a lot of other factors in terms of the electoral environment,” said Daniel Smith, a University of Florida professor and expert on such initiatives. “Ballot measures generally are easier to defeat than to pass.”

More than $196 million was spent in 2014 on TV ads touting and trashing this year’s crop of 158 statewide ballot measures; another $19.7 million was spent on local measures. TV ads are well known as an effective way to get a message to voters, and this year, many corporations and national advocacy groups lined up to have their say on the airwaves about the initiatives.

Related: Who's calling the shots in the states?

Groups backed by doctors and health insurers spent nearly $60 million to air TV ads to oppose Propositions 45 and 46 in California, putting them at the top of the TV spending pile. They got their way, as voters rejected the two measures, which would have required drug testing for doctors and special approval for insurers to raise rates.

The health care industry outspent Consumer Watchdog, an advocacy group, and trial lawyers, who backed the measures, by 7-1 on the airwaves.

Examples where big ad spending paid off for groups working to pass or block initiatives at the polls were plentiful. Some of the winning groups appeared not to face any opposition on the airwaves at all: Of the 21 groups that won both ad and ballot wars, 13 faced no ads aired on the other side of the issue.

Related: Who’s trying to influence your vote?

In Massachusetts, voters chose not to ban gambling after a casino-backed group ran about $5.7 million worth of ads claiming gaming was good for the economy. No ads ran in support of the ban.

There’s more to this story. Click here to read the rest at the Center for Public Integrity.

This story is part of Who’s Calling the Shots in State Politics?. The Center exposes the powerful special interests that drive elections and policy in the states. Click here to read more stories in this blog.

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Copyright 2014 The Center for Public Integrity. This story was published by The Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan investigative news organization in Washington, D.C.