Congressional Officials Grant Access to Individuals Because They Have Contributed to Campaigns: A Randomized Field Experiment*

Concern that donations to political campaigns secure preferential treatment from lawmakers has long occupied judges, scholars, and the public. However, the effects of political donations on legislators ’ behavior have proven notoriously difficult to assess. We first discuss reasons campaign donations may secure preferential treatment from lawmakers that may evade detection by traditional empirical approaches. We then present the first randomized field experiment on the effects of campaign contributions on access to policymakers. In the experiment, a political organization attempted to schedule meetings between 191 Congressional offices and active campaign donors in their districts. However, the organization randomly assigned whether it revealed to Congressional offices that prospective attendees had contributed to campaigns. When informed prospective attendees were political donors, senior policymakers made themselves available between three and four times more often (p < 0.01). These findings underscore concerns about the Supreme Court’s recent decisions deregulating campaign finance