This report identifies and ranks Texas’ top general-purpose political action committees (PACs) in the 2008 election cycle. These rankings are based on the total amount of expenditures that PACs electronically reported to the Texas Ethics Commission. During the two-year election cycle ending in December 2008, 1,209 general-purpose PACs reported expenditures.¹ The number of PACs active in the 2008 cycle exceeded that of any other election over the past decade. The total 2008 cycle spending by these PACs fell just short of $120 million. This marked a 21 percent increase from the $99 million that such PACs spent in the proceeding 2006 cycle.

This increase is striking, given that Texas political spending spikes in gubernatorial election years, when PACs dig deep to influence the elections of a large number of statewide officeholders. There was no gubernatorial election in 2008, which followed an extraordinary 2006 election featuring four well-funded gubernatorial candidates who collectively raised $42.3 million. The heavy spending in 2008 was driven in part by competing factions seeking to defend or topple recently deposed House Speaker Tom Craddick of Midland.

Texas PAC Spending Spikes In Gubernatorial Election Years

 

Election Cycle	No. of Active PACs	PAC Spending	Spending Increase From Previous Cycle	Spending Increase (%)
1998*	893	$51,543,820	$8,461,274	20%
2000	865	$53,996,975	$2,453,155	5%
2002*	964	$85,320,226	$31,323,251	58%
2004	850	$68,904,524	($16,415,702)	(19%)
2006*	1,132	$99,167,646	$30,263,122	44%
2008	1,209	$119,561,861	$20,394,215	21%

   *Gubernatorial election year.

 

One of the fastest-growing PACs from 2006 to 2008 was Texas Builds Jobs & Opportunity For Secure Future PAC. After spending less than $16,000 in 2006, Texas Jobs PAC received $250,000 from embattled Speaker Craddick’s campaign in January 2008—the largest campaign expenditure of Craddick’s career. The next day, Texas Jobs flipped a total of $150,000 of Craddick’s money to three Democratic Craddick allies facing primary challengers. These checks from Texas Jobs were the largest contributions that these candidates ever received.² This prompted Texans for Public Justice to file a pending Travis County District Attorney complaint alleging that the transactions violated a state law that bars speaker candidates from bankrolling the campaigns of candidates for the Texas House.³  House members choose a Speaker from their own ranks. Stars Over Texas PAC, organized to keep Craddick on the Speaker’s dais, also increased its 2008 spending 81 percent to almost $2 million. None of this was enough.

                    
Ex-House Speaker Tom Craddick                      House Speaker Joe Straus

 

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¹ The largest PAC expenditures typically are contributions to candidates or other PACs; PACs also spend money on overhead and other expenses—which also are included here.
² See “Bipartisan Texas Jobs PAC Defends Speaker’s Job,” TPJ’s Lobby Watch, February 14, 2008. http://info.tpj.org/Lobby_Watch/02-14-08_texasjobs.html
³ “Complaint Alleges That Beleaguered Speaker Craddick and Texas Jobs PAC Broke Texas Campaign Laws,” TPJ News Release, February 11, 2008. http://www.tpj.org/2008/02/tpj-files-complaint-against-speaker.html