Bellevue, WA political money — 2014 cycle

What the Bellevue × 2014 join measures

The overlap of contributor city BELLEVUE with state WA and election cycle 2014 is $207,740 across 60 itemized contribution rows. The city side of the table, covering every cycle in the aggregate, is $96,131,734. 2014 therefore accounts for 0.22% of Bellevue, WA itemized individual dollars in these facts. The remaining $95,923,994 (99.8%) was itemized in other cycles under the same city label.

This is not a restatement of Bellevue, WA. That hub mixes 2014 with every other even-year window filed under BELLEVUE. It is also not a restatement of the 2014 election cycle hub, which mixes Bellevue, WA with every other donor city in the United States. The 60 rows and $207,740 exist only where both filters are true. Correlation is not causation: a city code plus a cycle year does not prove why someone gave, whom they supported, or whether the recipient was local to Washington.

FEC individual contribution files record the contributor's city as entered on the itemized receipt. Spellings and suburb-versus-city choices can split a metro across multiple city pages. 2014 is a midterm FEC cycle: a two-year window without a presidential general election on the federal calendar. That calendar fact does not explain why Bellevue, WA donors itemized $207,740. Source: FEC.gov individual contribution aggregates by donor city and election cycle.

Bellevue, WA across every cycle

The city aggregate for Bellevue, WA is $96,131,734 in itemized individual contributions. That figure is the running total for this city label across cycles, not a single-year census and not a count of unique residents. It includes the $207,740 from 2014 and the $95,923,994 from every other cycle in the same city file. Washington campaign-finance pages still mix Bellevue with every other city in Washington.

The stored city is Bellevue, Washington, in King County. Seattle, Redmond, Kirkland, and Bellevue in Nebraska or Kentucky are not rolled into BELLEVUE in WA. State WA is required on the key. $96,131,734 is the WA key only. A large city total does not mean 2014 was large, and a small city total does not mean 2014 was small. For Bellevue, WA, the city stack is $96,131,734 while this cycle is $207,740 (0.22%). Use the city hub to see Bellevue, WA without a year filter, and use this tie page when the question is specifically Bellevue in 2014. Donor city is not the same as recipient city: committees that received these gifts can be anywhere in the FEC system.

The 2014 midterm window on FEC.gov

Federal election cycles are two-year windows on FEC.gov. The 2014 cycle is the Commission's cycle tag on itemized receipts, not a calendar year of January gifts only. Inside that window, Bellevue, WA donors itemized $207,740 on 60 contribution records. Dividing dollars by rows gives a mean of about $3,462 per itemized gift. That mean is an arithmetic average of rows, not a typical donor and not a median. This page does not publish a median or a unique-donor count.

The national 2014 hub still includes every other city. State pages for Washington still include every other cycle. Only this join isolates Bellevue × 2014. Unitemized contributions below the FEC itemization threshold are omitted. Independent expenditures and committee-to-committee transfers are other tables. 60 itemized rows is a small absolute count of receipts for this join. Adjacent pages for Bellevue, WA, the 2014 election cycle, and Washington campaign finance keep those broader cuts; this URL is the intersection only.

Share of the Bellevue city stack

0.22% of $96,131,734 is a modest slice of the city stack. The city hub is mostly other even-year windows, totaling $95,923,994. Put another way, about 0.22% of Bellevue, WA's itemized individual dollars in this aggregate were filed in 2014, and about 99.8% were not. Those percentages are $207,740 divided by $96,131,734 and $95,923,994 divided by $96,131,734. They are not shares of state totals, national cycle totals, or eligible voters.

Dollar share (0.22%) and row volume (60 itemized gifts) are separate facts. A thin dollar share can sit next to a large row count, or the reverse; both numbers describe this pair only. This packet does not include a citywide row count across all cycles, so a row-share percentage is not computed. Do not treat 0.22% as Bellevue's share of the 2014 national cycle, which is a different denominator and is not in these facts.

Rows, means, and missing fields

60 itemized contributions totaling $207,740 is the operational definition of this page. The FEC file can list the same household on multiple dates, to multiple committees, and under spelling variants of BELLEVUE. Unique-person counts are not in the packet and are not invented here. Neither is a ranking of Bellevue versus other Washington cities: this join has one geography and one cycle.

Mean gift size of about $3,462 uses only the two numbers in the join: $207,740 and 60 rows. It is a trivial ratio, not a finding about wealth, turnout, or ideology. Employer and occupation strings on those receipts are other joins. This city-cycle page does not break the $207,740 out by occupation, industry, or recipient committee. City labels are filer-entered. A donor who typed BELLEVUE is counted; a donor who typed a neighborhood, a firm city, or a nearby suburb is not recoded into Bellevue.

What this tie page is not

This page does not rank Bellevue against other cities, does not call 2014 a wave, and does not treat itemized giving as a proxy for public opinion in Washington. Two columns matched. The city of the contributor is not the city of the campaign. A WA address on an individual receipt does not mean the money supported a Washington candidate. Amended reports can move either number.

Unitemized gifts, independent expenditures, and non-individual sources are omitted. See Bellevue, WA, the 2014 election cycle, Washington campaign finance, and all FEC ties for the adjacent tables. Dollar figures are FEC itemized individual contribution aggregates. They are not federal spending awards and they do not fund USAspending totals. Source: FEC.gov.

Questions

How much did Bellevue, WA donors give in the 2014 election cycle?

FEC itemized individual contributions from donors listing Bellevue, WA total $207,740 in the 2014 cycle, across 60 contribution records. The same city label totals $96,131,734 across all cycles in this aggregate, so 2014 is 0.22% of that city stack. Figures are from FEC.gov city-by-cycle aggregates.

Is the Bellevue, WA city total only for 2014?

No. The city aggregate of $96,131,734 covers every cycle in the table for BELLEVUE. The 2014 filter is $207,740 from 60 itemized gifts. Other cycles hold $95,923,994. Use the city hub for the all-cycle total and this tie page for the 2014 slice.

Did Bellevue, WA 2014 donations stay in Washington?

Not necessarily. Donor city is Bellevue, WA; recipients can be committees anywhere that file with the FEC. This join does not allocate the $207,740 by office, state of the committee, or party. A WA city code is an address field on the individual receipt, not a map of Washington races.

How many Bellevue, WA contributions were itemized in 2014?

60 itemized contribution records sum to $207,740. That count is rows, not unique donors. The arithmetic mean is about $3,462 per row. Unitemized gifts below the FEC threshold and independent expenditures are not included. Citywide unique-donor counts are not in these facts.