Follow The Money: Alcohol Campaign Contributions the Last Election Cycle
Who in the alcohol biz is working hardest to buy protection?
As I attempt to keep abreast of the ever-evolving alcohol regulatory system, I try never to forget that the rules and regulations that we all follow are born of politics. Politics is simple: One set of interests battles to have their desires placed above another set of interests.
The tools deployed to accomplish this are money and lobbying.
I want to take a final look at the money that was deployed by alcohol industry interests during the just-completed election cycle (2023-2024). I want to demonstrate where the money is coming from and where it is going. To do this, I use FollowTheMoney.org, a very useful database operated by OpenSecrets, which was created when The National Institute on Money in Politics and The Center for Responsive Politics combined forces to track campaign contributions and lobbying efforts at the state and federal levels.
To look at money used by the alcohol industry to sway lawmakers, I’m looking today at JUST campaign contributions delivered to lawmakers at the state level, not the federal government. I do this because 99% of the laws governing alcohol sales and distribution are generated in the states. Importantly, the numbers and figures below do not represent the totality of campaign contributions for the past two years. There remain about 15% of reports to be included in the FollowTheMoney database. However, the 85% of the spending reports we have are more than sufficient to show the trends.
So…let’s follow the money.
More money was contributed during 2024. This makes sense since 2024. It is common for more contributions to be doled out during even years.
Wine, beer, and spirit wholesalers contributed over $17,000,000 to state-level candidates and causes in 2023 and 2024. This is more than double the entire rest of the alcohol industry—combined. The OpenSecrets database combines wine and spirit producers while carving out beer producers. Finally, there is a catchall category called “alcohol” which includes various industry actors.
The explanation for why alcohol wholesalers contributed far and away more than the rest of the industry is explained by the fact that wholesalers, supported and protected by the three-tier system, have the most to lose through reform. The entire goal of wholesaler giving is to block any and all reforms to the three-tier system and keep the alcohol flowing almost exclusively (and by legal mandate) through the wholesalers in each state.
These huge sums of campaign contributions from wholesalers guarantee them access to lawmakers and deference from lawmakers. In exchange, lawmakers receive a tremendous amount of funds for campaigning. If you think this is a cynical process, I will not attempt to disabuse you of that opinion. Suffice to say, this kind of spending has been going on for decades. Consider the following: