THE BAY CITY BEACON (SAN FRANCISCO) -- “Basically, voters do not really care about the source of the money spending on ads,” said Jason McDaniel, a professor of Political Science at San Francisco State University. “News coverage and candidate discussion of corporate ‘big money’ donors to one candidate may reinforce prior beliefs,” he added, “so someone predisposed to think that [late San Francisco Mayor] Ed Lee was ‘bought and paid for’ by tech companies might have that belief reinforced. But they were unlikely to be an Ed Lee voter anyway.”
Further, McDaniel remained skeptical that independent expenditures have as much of an impact on elections as a candidate’s own fundraising efforts. “Some research indicates that PAC money is less effective in terms of electoral outcomes than small dollar individual donations,” he said.