| South Carolina At least $901,129 -- Includes lobbyist expenditures and campaign contributions for 1992-96 June 9, 1997 Palmetto State gamblers have their choice of charitable bingo or video poker -- and that's it. The bingo and coin-op companies enjoy an absence of competition, and the legislature seems none too friendly to new forms of gambling. Lawmakers recently considered riverboat gambling and lottery bills, but none have passed either house, or made it to a ballot referendum. In fact, there's even a little-known statute that allows gamblers who lose more than $50 to get their money back through court. But gambling hasn't given up: This year, when the Legislature weighed new taxes on video poker and even passed a bill allowing individual counties to outlaw the game, video poker firms spent more than $300,000 lobbying to contain the damage. South Carolina's Ethics Commission keeps campaign finance records only on paper, available for 20 cents per page. But fortunately the capital newspaper, The State, had begun its own analysis. The paper's capitol bureau analyzed campaign contribution reports for 1992 through 1996, from the races for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, and other constitutional officers, and state Senate seats: Gambling interests gave at least $128,400 directly to candidates. Mother Jones obtained the lobbying disclosures for the following companies and found that the bigger money, as in many states, is spent on wining and dining lawmakers already in office. Gambling interests, primarily bingo and video poker companies, spent nearly $800,000 in the past five years on lobbying:
Source: South Carolina Secretary of State
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