Rise of outside money in Oklahoma

Abstract

David Magleby and other scholars detected a dramatic increase in outside money starting in the 1998 congressional elections. Outside money is money spent by the political parties and interest groups independent of a candidate's knowledge. Magleby notes that outside money is most noticeable in competitive or open seat races, causing candidates to lose control of their campaigns and voter confusion. This article examines the role and possible impact of outside money in the 2000 open congressional contest for the second district of Oklahoma between Brad Carsoo and Andy Ewing. Through interviews, newspaper articles and media outlet records, we found that both the role and impact of outside money were each primarily limited to party activity. Groups were only modestly active because the candidates did not differ from other on key issues and the race was only marginally competitive. Other findings include party activity can be detrimental to the candidates, it is difficult to distinguish between get out the vote activities (GOTV) and persuasion, voters can be confused by outside money, and predicting the competitiveness of a race can be difficult.