The U.S. cryptocurrency industry has become one of the most aggressive players in U.S. elections, but its spending has amplified scrutiny and backlash of the industry without delivering clear wins.

Between 2011 and 2025, proposals seeking disclosure of political spending won majority support at 30 companies, according to the Center for Political Accountability (CPA).

A total of $51m for the second half of 2025 remains unaccounted for due to this technical error, according to the Center for Political Accountability (CPA), a non-profit that tracks corporate spending.

The Center for Political Accountability (CPA), which has long worked with investors to promote political transparency, including by developing a model shareholder proposal and maintaining the CPA-Zicklin Index, a widely used measure of corporate political disclosure…

The CPA-Zicklin Index—developed by CPA and the Zicklin Center for Governance and Business Ethics at the Wharton School—has become the benchmark for measuring how transparently companies report and oversee their corporate-funded election-related spending…

The CPA both maintains the highly influential Zicklin index, which measures several components of issuer political transparency and assists investors in navigating one category of political disclosure proposals.

The number of leading U.S. companies with the most robust policies for transparency and accountability around their political spending increased significantly from 103 in 2024 to 112 this year…

Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Paul Atkins and the Trump administration are pushing to eliminate proxy resolutions that are advisory, which would be a fatal blow to resolutions calling for political transparency and board oversight.

Large U.S. corporations are doing a better job of making public their political activity, but they have a long way to go. That’s the conclusion of an annual survey of S&P 500 companies done by the Center for Political Accountability and the Zicklin Center for Governance and Business Ethics at the Wharton School of the…

Despite political headwinds, a record 112 S&P 500 companies scored 90 percent or better on measures such as whether they disclose political spending with corporate funds, or make boards responsible for overseeing it.

Some 205 companies in the overall S&P 500 scored over 80%, or in the first tier, of the 2025 CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability, a benchmarking study released Thursday.

A forthcoming article on Private Ordering, authored by CPA.

Republicans have received around $284,000 compared to Democratsʼ roughly $215,000, though Chubb has only donated to Republicans in the past two years, according to data compiled by the Center for Political Accountability…

Despite a downward trend in the overall number of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) shareholder proposals, support for shareholder proposals demanding increased political accountability and transparency surged in the 2025 proxy season…

CPA’s 2025 report, Corporate Political Spending: What Are the Real Risk?, underscores the reputational and legal hazards of misaligned political spending.

Campaign spending disclosure proposals passed at five companies this season, and eight others saw similar resolutions.

Companies have a duty to protect shareholders from a range of risks – especially those that threaten revenue and competitiveness in a global economy. As corporate political spending grows more complex, so do the financial and reputational risks it poses.

“If you’re going to give, you have to have robust disclosures and oversight,” Freed said.

This proxy season, 13 companies have seen basically the same disclosure resolution on their ballots, according to figures from the non-partisan Center for Political Accountability, with the final one facing a vote last Friday…five majority votes in one season is almost unheard of. The resolution won one majority vote last year.

When retribution from the Oval Office threatens the nation’s legal system, there is cause for worry in C-Suites across America.

“While the companies making these contributions may be seeking a favorable regulatory environment, these political donations further erode public trust and expose companies to legal, reputational, and business risks…”

A new report warns of “profound risks” in American politics as cryptocurrency companies increase their political spending and Donald Trump oversees regulatory retreat while promising to create a “crypto strategic reserve”.

What is a 501(c)(4) organization? According to The 2024 CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability, IRC section 501(c)(4) exempts from federal income tax “certain civic groups and nonprofit organizations, whose primary purpose is to promote social welfare.”

“With Donald Trump, everything is transactional and based on his animosity towards people. Some companies donate to gain access, while others do so for protection,” Bruce Freed explains

“Every company is lining up to ‘buy favors,'” said Bruce Freed, CPA President.

“The donations to the inaugural fund are basically to gain favour and to gain access,” said Bruce Freed, president and co-founder of the Center for Political Accountability

The high risk of getting political spending wrong makes it ripe for focused oversight, said Bruce Freed, president of the Center for Political Accountability.

In thinking ahead to the 2025 proxy season, companies should consider, among other things, their CPA-Zicklin Index score.

When Donald Trump was elected the 47th US president earlier this month, he did so with considerable help from corporate America. But corporate money is not just deeply embedded in political campaigns, it also has a major influence on the success or failure of specific legislation.

The Index’s data reflect leading companies holding firm overall to established norms of political disclosure and accountability, despite fierce headwinds against environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and related principles for investors and U.S. corporations.

In 2020, fewer than half of companies in the S&P 500 disclosed their election-related contributions to PACs and trade associations, according to the Center for Political Accountability. Among those that did disclose, two-thirds of their spending went to trade associations.

Wells Fargo gave a total of $704,300 to three Democratic and three Republican organizations known as 527s that are focused on electing governors, attorneys general and state lawmakers, according to data from the Center for Political Accountability

“two of the largest institutional investors, BlackRock and Vanguard, voted for CPA’s resolution for the first time last year. BlackRock did so for six of the 12 CPA resolutions and Vanguard for three.”

Electric co-ops top industry’s political contributions; utilities change approach.

DoorDash and CVS also contributing funds to Raga group trying to re-elect Todd Rokita, who favors total abortion ban.

As it sought a massive, corrupt bailout in Ohio, Akron-based FirstEnergy also spent lavishly on Trump-aligned dark money groups and at hotels and golf courses owned by the former president, a new report said this week.

…the Center for Political Accountability issued an analysis that showed Comcast and other corporations that have liberal abortion employee policies were major contributors to the Republican State Leadership Committee.

87 percent of respondents said they believe publicly traded companies should be required to have a code of conduct for assessing and governing their political spending

“What’s important to understand is that they are doing this in a social setting, so [lobbyists and staffers] become friends. It’s not just lobbyists going into the office,” said Bruce Freed, president of the Center for Political Accountability.

A recently released survey, commissioned by the Zicklin Center for Governance and Business Ethics at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Center for Political Accountability and conducted by a leading non-partisan polling firm, set out to identify how retail shareholders expect companies to approach, govern and assess their political spending

What exactly is the scope and impact of corporate political spending? Much has been written about the risks – legal, reputational and bottom line – faced by companies engaging in this spending.

Corporate Underwriters: Where the Rubber Hits the Road, from the nonpartisan Center for Political Accountability, examines “the scope of corporate political spending and its impact on state and national politics and policy” by taking a deeper dive into six highly influential “527” organizations.

Voters who are invested in the stock market want more transparency of corporate political spending, according to a new poll released as races heat up for the White House and down-ballot offices.

CEOs are looking to keep doors open” with both Republicans and Democrats.

Even as some corporate bigwigs have taken to the sidelines, Trump’s fundraising has outstripped President Biden’s.

It’s a real problem and it raises questions in terms of conflicts and what the companies are doing, and how their money is being used,” said Bruce Freed, the president of the nonpartisan Center for Political Accountability.

“Climate change is such an important area of risk,” says Jeanne Hanna, research director at the Center for Political Accountability. “A lot of companies acknowledge that they face quantifiable economic risks if climate change carries on. It can do damage to their markets. It could do damage to their production. Companies themselves recognize it as…

Of the 345 companies that have been on the S&P 500 since 2015, 270 of them now prohibit or fully disclose spending on candidates or their committees. That’s up from 168 a few years prior, according to CPA’s analysis

“The index is recognized by companies as credible and serious. It is respected,” Bruce Freed, CPA president, told DMI. “Increasingly, companies want to be ‘Trendsetters’ (achieving scores of 90+ out of 100) that they can tout to show their best practices. In the 2023 index, 39% of the S&P 500 were in the top quintile.”

Even if executives hope to steer clear of this election, “if they engage in political spending, they’re speaking,” said Bruce Freed, president of The Center For Political Accountability, which has pushed for spending disclosures. “They won’t be sitting it out. As long as they’re giving, that creates risk because of what it associates them with.”

There’s a noticeable trend in the S&P 500 towards political disclosure and accountability becoming the norm, with a significant percentage of companies scoring high on the CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability.

Freed told Popular Information that the corporations sending millions in PAC donations to election deniers are “putting themselves at risk.” He thinks the companies are underestimating the economic danger of undermining “the rule of law.” Instead of focusing on the preservation of “the political system that they need to be able to operate and grow,”…

A rush of shareholder proposals demanding transparency have been filed for the 2024 proxy season, with a strong emphasis on lobbying alignment.

With corporate political disclosure and accountability accepted as the norm, the next step for companies is to put in place a framework for approaching, governing and assessing their election-related spending.

The vast majority of companies utilize various forms of public policy advocacy to impact legislative and regulatory decisions mainly through lobbying and campaign contributions.

“Now, the CPA has developed a Guide to Becoming a Model Code Company, designed to help companies and their boards understand the Model Code and how it can help them manage election-related political spending in high-risk environments…”

Three fundraising accounts tied to key Michigan Democrats each got contributions of at least $200,000 from a nonprofit bankrolled by one of the state’s largest electric utilities in 2022, according to a tax filing obtained by The Detroit News.

Big brands like Comcast, Walmart, Pfizer, and AT&T fund the ring-wing political group that wrecked our democracy.

“They’ve reverted to spending as usual, and they are engaging in spending for access.”

As we begin this new year—a highly charged election year—it might be helpful to check out the Guide to Corporate Political Spending produced by the non-partisan Center for Political Accountability.

The number of public corporations in the S&P 500 Index getting scores of 90 percent or better, called Trendsetters, jumped from 89 last year to a record 100 now, according to data in the 2023 CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability.

One fifth of S&P 500 firms rank as ‘trendsetters’ in 2023 CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability…

One fifth of S&P 500 firms rank as ‘trendsetters’ in 2023 CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability.

As the U.S. continues to look polarized politically, a growing number of S&P 500 companies have made the effort to earn the highest scores from a watchdog organization that’s focused on transparency in corporate political spending.