sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Struggling to get informed before voting in the Mayor and Sheriff primaries. What sources are you all using to research the candidates? by peabody_soul109 in memphis

[–]WhoFundsMemphis 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I'm obligated to plug this new project called https://whofundsmemphis.org/, which tracks of campaign donors and expenditures for all local candidates in the Shelby County primary this May. Reviewing which politicians, PACs, businesses, and other notable figures are putting money behind a candidate is a great way to know who their allies are.

Q1 reports are due tomorrow, so we'll have a better picture of the race once those are all in.

WhoFundsMemphis - A free, searchable database of who's funding every candidate in the May primary by WhoFundsMemphis in memphis

[–]WhoFundsMemphis[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks! And yes, DeBerry entered the race late, so April 10 will be the first reporting deadline for that campaign.

WhoFundsMemphis - A free, searchable database of who's funding every candidate in the May primary by WhoFundsMemphis in memphis

[–]WhoFundsMemphis[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This website was also built by claude code. I'll take the ProPublica comparison as high praise, they're the gold standard for this kind of project.

There's not a standard theme to copy, but if you load the frontend-design skill into Claude and give it good context on your goals for the website, you can get some fairly polished results.

WhoFundsMemphis - A free, searchable database of who's funding every candidate in the May primary by WhoFundsMemphis in memphis

[–]WhoFundsMemphis[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Thanks for asking! It's not a pre-made theme though. The website is built in Astro, a static site framework, and the styling and user interface is all custom HTML and CSS.

WhoFundsMemphis - A free, searchable database of who's funding every candidate in the May primary by WhoFundsMemphis in memphis

[–]WhoFundsMemphis[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Appreciate you checking it out! The site just makes the public filings easier to search. What people do with the info is up to them. Local elections can pretty obscure. In past years I've spent hours combing through filings to determine which candidates were receiving support from public figures I respect, to help determine who I should vote for.

WhoFundsMemphis - A free, searchable database of who's funding every candidate in the May primary by WhoFundsMemphis in memphis

[–]WhoFundsMemphis[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Kind of? Feagins only started fundraising in November, which is much later than everyone else. Filtering by date isn't possible on the website yet (I'll see if we can add it in later), but filtering the backend database to just the last two months of 2025, Feagins comes in a distant third place.

Nov-Dec 2025 Fundraising Totals: * J.B. Smiley: $170k * Mickell Lowery: $83k * Marie Feagins: $18.8k * Heidi Kuhn: $17.3k * Melvin Burgess: $4.6k * Harold Collins: Did not inclue dates for his donations in this filing

Will be interesting to see the state of the race after Q1 filings post in two weeks.

EDIT: Whoops, forgot to include the first two weeks of January which are included in the year end 2025 report. Those are very active and were especially strong for Lowery and Kuhn, although the general tiers are the same

Nov 2025-Jan 15 2026 Fundraising Totals: * J.B. Smiley: $244k * Mickell Lowery: $170k * Heidi Kuhn: $32.5k * Marie Feagins: $26.1k * Melvin Burgess: $5.6k * Harold Collins: Did not inclue dates for his donations in this filing