Top 10 US States by Aggregate FEC, LDA, and Federal Contract Totals
State-level rollup of FEC-recorded contributions to candidate committees, LDA-recorded lobbying spending, and federal contract awards.
Research period:
Research question
Across 50 states (plus DC), which carry the largest aggregate recorded total across FEC contributions received by candidates from that state, LDA lobbying spending by organizations headquartered there, and federal contracts awarded to organizations there?
Methodology
This ranking is compiled directly from FEC, Senate LDA, and USAspending state-level records, no figure is typed in by hand, and the numbers update whenever the underlying dataset is refreshed. States with no recorded activity on the ranked measure are excluded rather than shown with a zero, since a true zero and "no data reported" are different facts.
Where a source agency suppresses a value (for confidentiality, small sample size, or quality control), that record is left out of this ranking rather than displayed as zero. If an agency later revises a figure, the revision appears here automatically the next time PlainInfluence refreshes its data, no manual edit to this page is needed.
A named editor reviews this page before publication, and disputed figures can be corrected through the contact channels in the footer, corrections are reconciled against the official source record before anything changes here.
See the methodology page for the complete ETL pipeline, source vintage, and column lineage.
Top 10 US States by Aggregate FEC, LDA, and Federal Contract Totals
Compiled directly from FEC, Senate LDA, and USAspending records
The ranked top 10
Every row below reflects the current 10-record ranking. Refresh the page after PlainInfluence's next data update to see the latest values.
| # | State | Abbr | FEC-filed politicians | FEC contributions | LDA lobbying | Federal contracts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Virginia | VA | 140 | $10.8M | $687.1M | $78.6B |
| 2 | District of Columbia | DC | 14 | $149K | $3.8B | $43.5B |
| 3 | Arizona | AZ | 141 | $8.8M | $67.0M | $16.4B |
| 4 | Texas | TX | 406 | $28.1M | $402.0M | $14.3B |
| 5 | California | CA | 588 | $53.3M | $842.9M | $8.0B |
| 6 | Colorado | CO | 148 | $6.8M | $96.4M | $5.9B |
| 7 | Maryland | MD | 204 | $5.7M | $131.6M | $5.1B |
| 8 | Ohio | OH | 181 | $20.0M | $114.2M | $3.7B |
| 9 | Illinois | IL | 155 | $16.4M | $401.7M | $2.9B |
| 10 | Pennsylvania | PA | 154 | $27.4M | $207.8M | $2.4B |
Source: Federal Election Commission, U.S. Senate, USAspending.gov, PlainInfluence state-level FEC + LDA + USAspending rollup. Values reflect PlainInfluence's current data snapshot and update whenever the underlying dataset is refreshed. Federal Election Commission, U.S. Senate, USAspending.gov, PlainInfluence state-level FEC + LDA + USAspending rollup. Values reflect PlainInfluence's current data snapshot and update whenever the underlying dataset is refreshed.
Findings
Top entity in the ranking
The top-ranked record in this dataset is Virginia, with a value of $78.6B on the Federal contracts column. The full top-10 set is shown in the table above; no number here is typed in by hand. When the source agency publishes a revision, the ranking and this text update automatically the next time PlainInfluence refreshes its data.
Distribution shape
The gap between the top-ranked record ($78.6B) and the 10th-ranked record ($2.4B) characterizes how concentrated the top of the distribution is. Where the top value is many multiples of the median value of the visible set, the population is highly concentrated, a small number of entities accumulate the bulk of the measured quantity. Where the top and bottom of the visible set are close together, the distribution is relatively flat across the top end. The full distribution beyond this top-10 cut is summarized in the aggregate context section below and explored in the linked entity profiles.
Aggregate context
Across the full population behind this ranking, here are the summary statistics: how many records exist in total, the sum of the ranking metric across all qualifying records, and the mean per-record value. The methodology page documents the exact filter applied (records with null or zero values on the ranking metric are excluded). This aggregate row is computed from the same dataset that powers the ranking above.
Source provenance
The records in this ranking originate from Federal Election Commission, U.S. Senate, USAspending.gov, specifically the PlainInfluence state-level FEC + LDA + USAspending rollup. PlainInfluence compiles this data directly from the agencies' published releases; there is no static export carrying stale numbers, and an updated dataset propagates to this page within hours. The methodology page documents the source URL, the data vintage, and how the figures are derived.
Why this ranking matters
Rankings like this one let a reader scan a population quickly and identify outliers, concentrations, and patterns that warrant deeper investigation. The detail pages linked from each entity in the table above give the full per-entity context: time-series history where available, related metrics from adjacent tables, and links onward to the underlying source records. The methodology page explains how an entity earns inclusion in the dataset and how the ranking column is computed at the source.
What this analysis cannot tell us
State assignment for federal contracts reflects the awardee's recorded address in USAspending data; the actual location of work performance may differ. FEC contributions received are aggregated to the state of the recipient candidate, not the geographic origin of the contributing individuals or PACs. LDA lobbying totals are aggregated to the state of the lobbying organization's headquarters as recorded in their LDA registration. The District of Columbia consistently shows large LDA totals because it hosts many lobbying firms; this reflects organizational headquarters location, not policy origination. Contracts awarded to defense, aerospace, and federal-services contractors create concentrated state-level totals (notably Virginia, Maryland, California) that reflect industry geography rather than any state-government action.
Secondary cut from the same source
Top 10 states by LDA-recorded lobbying total (headquarters location)
Sources
- Federal Election Commission - https://www.fec.gov/data/
- U.S. Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act Database - https://lda.senate.gov/system/public/
- USAspending.gov - https://www.usaspending.gov/