Sen. James E. Risch

About the data

Gun Rights and Gun Control data from the Center for Responsive Politics.

• The first row is money in support of a candidate on gun rights (“rights” = against placing restrictions on firearms, typically more Republican)

• The second row is in support of gun control (“control” = supports placing restrictions on firearms, typically more Democratic)

• The first column is direct contributions: groups like the NRA & Everytown directly giving money to a candidate

• The second two columns are independent expenditure: those groups running ads to support/oppose candidates, funneling money through other organizations

• Total: the total money given to the member’s campaign or leadership PAC from gun rights or gun control PACs or individuals in all of CRP’s data (back to 1989 for members for whom that is relevant).

• Support/oppose: numbers are money spent by outside groups supporting and opposing these candidates. Gun rights support, for example, shows money spent by gun rights groups on independent expenditures supporting this candidate.

• Net funding (internal) is gun rights funding (gun rights total, gun rights support, gun control opposition) minus gun control funding (gun control total, gun control support, gun rights opposition)

• Ranking uses the net funding amount—from most gun rights to most gun control, with those with zero funding in the middle