We’ve been following the outside money being spent in our local races pretty closely through our Public File series. 

DC808 has this report about one of the bigger players:

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, backing Republican Linda Lingle’s campaign in Hawaii, is the largest second-largest outside spender in more than two dozen Senate and House races this year.

That analysis, titled “Tipping Elections with Secret Cash?” comes from Public Citizen and the Main Street Alliance. 

“This year, the U.S. Chamber has committed to spend more than $100 million in our elections. The Chamber is flooding the airwaves with partisan political ads, many of them attack ads, and working to put politicians in office to advance its own corporate agenda in the next Congress,” Lisa Gilbert, director of Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division, said in a press release Thursday.

According to the analysis, the Chamber is the biggest non-disclosing outside spender in five Senate and 10 House races and is No. 2 in four other Senate races and nine other House races.

— Michael Levine