Diversifying the Donor Pool: How Did Seattle's Democracy Voucher Program Reshape Participation in Municipal Campaign Finance?

Abstract

In this article, we evaluate whether an innovative new campaign finance program in Seattle, Washington, shifted the composition of campaign donors in local elections. In 2015, voters in Seattle approved the creation of the Democracy Voucher program with the intent of broadening representation in the campaign finance system and expanding participation from marginalized communities. Every registered voter in Seattle was provided with four 25-dollar vouchers that they could, in turn, assign to the local candidate(s) of their choice. Through an analysis of the inaugural implementation of the program in 2017, we investigate whether this innovative public financing system increased participation, broadened involvement from underrepresented groups, and led to a donor pool that was more representative of the electorate. Compared to cash donors in the municipal election, we report that voucher users are less likely to be high-income and more likely to come from poor neighborhoods. While older residents are overrepresented among voucher users, there is little difference in the racial composition of cash donors and voucher users. Our analysis confirms that the Democracy Voucher program successfully moved the donor pool in a more egalitarian direction, although it remains demographically unrepresentative of the electorate. The lessons from Seattle's inaugural implementation offer key insights for other municipalities considering public financing policies, and these lessons have the potential to reshape the national policy debate about the influence of political money.

Campaign Finance Vouchers Do Not Expand the Diversity of Donors: Evidence from Seattle

“…Little work has studied the Seattle case directly. McCabe and Heerwig (2019) use 2017 data to conclude that vouchers "moved the donor pool in a more egalitarian direction," 1 but do find that members of overrepresented groups utilized vouchers more. Additional mobilization efforts within Seattle boosted participation primarily among the overrepresented (Henderson and Han 2022).…”

Campaign finance vouchers do not reduce donor inequality

“…Kousser and Mullin (2007) find that assignment to mail voting disproportionately lowers turnout among citizens who are nonwhite, younger, and not members of a major political party. While McCabe and Heerwig (2019) use 2017 data to conclude that Democracy Vouchers "moved the voter pool in a more egalitarian direction," 1 they also find that members of overrepresented groups utilized vouchers more than members of underrepresented groups. Blanket mobilization efforts additionally fail to close the participation gap.…”

The Effects of Public Campaign Funding: Evidence from Seattle's Democracy Voucher Program

“…(Seattle Ethics & Elections Commission, 2018 20 This regime dates to Buckley v. Valeo (1976), which considered the constitutionality of the 1974 FEC Act. This constitutional structure is discussed in detail in, for example, McCabe and Heerwig (2019). More recently, the right of non-campaign actors to spend freely in elections has been broadly upheld in McConnell v. Federal Election Commission (2003) and Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010).…”

“…These studies are descriptive in nature, generally describing the donor pools pre-and post-implementation. For example,McCabe and Heerwig (2019) show that in the 2017 the number of voters who used their vouchers represented 4.03% of the voting age population, a significant increase from the 1.49% that made a cash donation in 2013. They also note that the donor pool in 2017 overrepresented older and wealthy individuals compared to their share in the population.3 This is in Section 5101 and labeled the "My Voice Voucher Pilot Program".…”