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In presidential race, who's getting techies' money?

Index offers a peek at which top fund-raisers appear to be doing well with the tech crowd so far.

Declan McCullagh Former Senior Writer
Declan McCullagh is the chief political correspondent for CNET. You can e-mail him or follow him on Twitter as declanm. Declan previously was a reporter for Time and the Washington bureau chief for Wired and wrote the Taking Liberties section and Other People's Money column for CBS News' Web site.
Declan McCullagh
4 min read
The 2008 U.S. presidential race is already well under way, never mind that the election is nearly 19 months in the future.

Presidential hopefuls have raised more than $115 million so far this year, according to federal filings that became available last week. That's about four times the amount the candidates raised at this point four years ago.

To provide a glimpse into what kind of money is coming from computer programmers, engineers and Web types, CNET News.com compiled the following index. Based on these figures reflecting contributions in the first quarter of this year, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama seems to hold a slight edge over fellow Democrat Sen. Hillary Clinton among people living and working in Seattle and Silicon Valley.

Among Republicans, former Gov. Mitt Romney may have a slight lead in this area over former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Both Democratic candidates, however, have raised more money than their Republican counterparts. We scored only the top two fund-raisers from each major party, which left out other candidates including former Sen. John Edwards, a Democrat, and Sen. John McCain, who is seeking the Republican nomination.

As for who's tech-friendliest among the current senators vying for the White House, not one received a passing grade in CNET News.com's 2006 technology voter guide. Clinton received a failing grade of 33 percent, and Obama did only slightly better with a 50 percent. McCain ranked worse than either, at 31 percent. (Here's our Tech Politics podcast talking about this topic with the Computer & Communications Industry Association.)

Total number of contributions received:
Clinton (D): 16,282
Obama (D): 20,459
Giuliani (R): 9,703
Romney (R): 14,832

Total dollar amount of contributions received, not including from political committees:
Clinton (D): $25,818,302
Obama (D): $25,706,054
Giuliani (R): $14,675,283
Romney (R): $20,841,938

Contributions listing occupation matching "Internet" or "computer":
Clinton (D): 13
Obama (D): 16
Giuliani (R): 7
Romney (R): 11

Contributions listing occupation matching "software":
Clinton (D): 25
Obama (D): 112
Giuliani (R): 8
Romney (R): 36

Contributions listing occupation matching "attorney" or "lawyer":
Clinton (D): 2,090
Obama (D): 3,170
Giuliani (R): 898
Romney (R): 965

Contributions listing occupation matching "executive":
Clinton (D): 581
Obama (D): 425
Giuliani (R): 411
Romney (R): 812

Contributions listing Recording Industry Association of America or the Motion Picture Association of America as employer:
Clinton (D): 3
Obama (D): 3
Giuliani (R): 0
Romney (R): 1

Contributions listing Google as employer:
Clinton (D): 13
Obama (D): 22
Giuliani (R): 1
Romney (R): 0

Contributions listing Cisco Systems as employer:
Clinton (D): 22
Obama (D): 3
Giuliani (R): 3
Romney (R): 1

Contributions listing Microsoft as employer:
Clinton (D): 10
Obama (D): 18
Giuliani (R): 1
Romney (R): 5

Contributions listing Apple Inc. or Apple Computer as employer:
Clinton (D): 3
Obama (D): 1
Giuliani (R): 0
Romney (R): 1

Contributions listing Intel Corporation as employer:
Clinton (D): 1
Obama (D): 4
Giuliani (R): 0
Romney (R): 2

Contributions listing Adobe Systems as employer:
Clinton (D): 1
Obama (D): 3
Giuliani (R): 0
Romney (R): 1

Contributions listing Jones Day, the second largest U.S. law firm, with about 240 attorneys in its Washington office, as employer:
Clinton (D): 1
Obama (D): 92
Giuliani (R): 14
Romney (R): 2

Contributions listing San Francisco as address:
Clinton (D): 538
Obama (D): 416
Giuliani (R): 89
Romney (R): 99

Contributions listing New York, New York as address:
Clinton (D): 2,888
Obama (D): 1,546
Giuliani (R): 1,284
Romney (R): 453

Contributions listing Salt Lake City as address:
Clinton (D): 12
Obama (D): 21
Giuliani (R): 14
Romney (R): 532

Contributions listing Boston as address:
Clinton (D): 153
Obama (D): 95
Giuliani (R): 12
Romney (R): 282

Contributions listing Seattle as address:
Clinton (D): 48
Obama (D): 186
Giuliani (R): 9
Romney (R): 29

Contributions listing San Jose, Calif. as address:
Clinton (D): 40
Obama (D): 49
Giuliani (R): 5
Romney (R): 1

Contributions listing Berkeley, Calif. as address:
Clinton (D): 62
Obama (D): 108
Giuliani (R): 1
Romney (R): 4

Contributions listing Dallas as address:
Clinton (D): 41
Obama (D): 133
Giuliani (R): 409
Romney (R): 146

Contributions listing some form of church, such as Baptist, Mormon or Presbyterian, as an affiliation:
Clinton (D): 10
Obama (D): 20
Giuliani (R): 6
Romney (R): 8

Contributions listing occupation as "student":
Clinton (D): 136
Obama (D): 225
Giuliani (R): 55
Romney (R): 125

Contributions listing affiliation with a law school:
Clinton (D): 7
Obama (D): 37
Giuliani (R): 2
Romney (R): 0

Contributions listing affiliation with a business school:
Clinton (D): 3
Obama (D): 3
Giuliani (R): 1
Romney (R): 12

Contributions listing occupation as "retired":
Clinton (D): 1,268
Obama (D): 1,655
Giuliani (R): 874
Romney (R): 1,457

Contributions listing occupation as "homemaker":
Clinton (D): 834
Obama (D): 508
Giuliani (R): 763
Romney (R): 1,690

Contributions listing occupation as "entrepreneur":
Clinton (D): 11
Obama (D): 27
Giuliani (R): 9
Romney (R): 42

Disclaimers: We're listing each contribution, not each person. So someone who signed up to have a credit card billed every month for three months would be counted as three contributions.

Our figures may understate actual contributors if we didn't catch all the abbreviations. For instance, the same group is listed as "Motion Picture Assoc. of America," "Motion Picture Assn. of America," and "Motion Picture Association of America." Also, if someone chooses not to give an affiliation, we can't count it.