Are Tester and Rehberg Taking “Bad” Money? You be the Judge

Jon Tester and Denny Rehberg are fighting back and forth over campaign donations.  Rehberg has been accused of not fully disclosing information (specifically, not posting the occupations of donors). Rehberg has long accused Tester of being the largest recipient of lobbyist money in the United States.

Well, you can look at the books yourself. There's no need to wait for journalists like myself or opposing candidates to find out where the money is coming from. If you're interested in finding more information about where the candidates get there money go to www.fec.gov.

Here are some links for Denny Rehberg and Jon Tester's donors.

So far, from my inspection, it appears that Jon Tester's campaign is being a little hypocritical about accusing Rehberg for not fully disclosing the occupations of his donors. If readers go to tab 18 on the individual contributions page for Tester you will see that a donor's occupation is not disclosed. I stopped clicking when I found one, I'm sure there are more. Frankly, the whole fight is a bit of a non-issue for me. The lacking information is simply the result of people who send in money without completely filling out the forms.

Much more interesting for me are the committee donations. These are the large group donations (unions, banks, corporations, e.t.c.). If anything big is going to be found in the numbers, I'm sure it will on these pages. Why does Bank of America and Credit Suisse Securities back Tester? Why do mining and coal industries back Rehberg? These are much more interesting questions.