Rural versus Urban

While all the candidates collected more of their contributions from urban areas, Clean Elections candidates received 1.5 times as much, proportionately, from zip codes with higher rural populations—15.7 percent of their contributions, versus 10.5 percent. The state’s most urban areas, in contrast, were the source of 66.9 percent of privately funded candidates’ big contributions versus 50.5 percent of Clean Elections candidates’ qualifying contributions.

A close up view of 2006 candidates shows a similar pattern. Notably, Don Goldwater raised the most, proportionately, in Clean Elections qualifying contributions from high rural areas in comparison to other Clean Elections candidates. He collected 29.2 percent of his qualifying contributions from these zip codes; Napolitano and Munsil raised 15.4 and 14.5 percent, respectively. Privately funded U.S. Senate candidate Sen. Kyl generated 10.4 percent of his contributions from these zip codes, and Pederson generated 10.9 percent.

Geographic Diversity

Another way to look at geography is to examine contributions by county. The graph below shows that Clean Elections candidates’ $5 contributions more closely mirror the population levels of various counties than do big donors to privately funded candidates.

Note: The bars represent the difference between the percentage of contributions that come from a particular county and the percentage of Arizona’s population that lives in that county. If the bar is above zero it means the candidate raised a disproportionately high amount of contributions from that county. If the bar is below zero, it means the candidate raised a disproportionately low amount of contributions from that county. The closer the bar is to zero, the more proportionate the fundraising.

Maricopa County is Arizona’s most populous county, and Pima is the second. More than three-quarters of the population live in these two counties and more than 60 percent in Maricopa alone. Clean Elections and privately funded candidates all raised a disproportionate high amount of campaign cash from these two counties. However, the reliance on Maricopa County was four times more extreme for privately funded candidates than it was for Clean Elections candidates.

In State Versus Out of State

By definition, all of the $5 contributions that Clean Elections candidates collect must come from people living in Arizona. However, there is no similar rule for privately funded candidates—they may collect contributions from wherever they can.