Data Acquisition
The Georgia Government Transparency & Campaign Finance Commission provides access to campaign finance reports in two ways:
- Bulk CSV Downloads – Contributions and expenditures from 2021 to present can be downloaded as comma-separated-value (CSV) files.
- Georgia’s Campaign Finance Web Interfaces – Georgia appears to be transitioning between two campaign finance systems, referred to here as the “new” and “legacy” systems. As the transaction counts decrease in the legacy system, they seem to increase in the new system, and each system has different candidate and PAC identifiers, so there does not appear to be any overlap. Both systems offer multiple interfaces for exploring campaign finance information.
- New System – The new website provides data filters from 2014 to the present.
- Legacy System – A different, older website provides data from 2006 to 2023. However, data from 2022 onward is limited, and many of the dates appear to have been misreported.
Transparency USA downloads and imports the bulk CSV files from 2021 to 2023 and scrapes the legacy system from 2017 to 2023.
Reported Data
Transparency USA processes all CSV file types: Contributions and Expenditures.
We obtained transactions from 2017 through 2023 from the legacy system in a one-time data retrieval. We downloaded transactions starting in 2021 from the new system and will continue to import only new data from this system moving forward.
We have implemented a process to normalize addresses to match USPS standards for all transactions and fix common misspellings.
Candidates/Committees
These records represent candidates and committees required to submit campaign finance reports to the state. Although the state does not offer a downloadable list, Transparency USA compiles this information from transaction data.
Our system is designed to associate all transactions with an individual committee. However, Georgia candidates are not always required to register for a committee. To accurately present this information on our website, we’ve created committees titled “Unregistered Committee for <Candidate Name>.”
Because we’ve integrated data from two systems, duplicate committees appear on the Transparency USA website due to the state’s non-reuse of identifiers after the system migration. To ensure data accuracy, we’ve kept committees separate even if they share the same name. Therefore, you’ll find data from 2017 to 2022 under a “Legacy” committee and from 2021 onward under a “New” committee. This does not affect Transparency USA’s candidate pages since we provide a unified candidate page grouping all of their committees in addition to the individual committee pages.
Contributions
These records include all contributions, including monetary and non-monetary in-kind contributions.
During our validation process, Transparency USA noted that transactions reported as “cash dividends and interest” and “unitemized less than $100” do not appear in either transaction source. Although the aggregate number is available on the reports, it was not easily attainable programmatically like it is in some states. This absence accounts for the differences between the figures reported by the state and those presented on our website.
Additionally, we identified records missing name and address details. To align with the state’s website, we have categorized these as “Anonymous.”
Transparency USA also excludes transactions that are missing a “Contribution Type.” According to the state’s documentation, such transactions are generally identified as “Loans” and have been classified accordingly in our system.
Expenditures
These records include all expenditures, including monetary and non-monetary in-kind expenditures.
During our validation process, we identified records missing name and address details. These fall into two categories: “unitemized less than $100”, which we have aggregated as “Aggregated Unitemized Expenditures,” and “Investment”, which we now call “Unknown Investment Name” transactions.
Transactions categorized as “Reimbursement” or “Credit Cards” aggregate multiple individual credit card transactions linked to the committee. While the details of these individual transactions are not available in the bulk download files, they can be accessed on the state’s website.
Transparency USA imports all data from these files.
Loans
These records include all loans reported on the “Contributions” form.
On the state website, loans are categorized as contributions. At Transparency USA, we have a separate loans tab and do not display them as contributions. Additionally, we do not track whether a loan has been repaid or forgiven. Loans are provided in the 2021 and later downloads, but not in the legacy transaction data.
Electronic Filing Requirement
Any candidate or committee that must file a report must do so electronically.
Additional Information
On the Georgia website, the reported PDFs display more information than they make available in the downloaded CSV files, specifically the Reports/Cover Summaries, including Cash on Hand.
Party Information
Transparency USA displays the current party affiliation for active candidates and officeholders. The party information displayed may not be accurate:
- For candidates who are not actively running for or serving in state-level office
- When accessing candidate or officeholder data from previous election cycles
Party affiliation for active candidates and officeholders is provided by Ballotpedia.