With Super Tuesday quickly approaching and candidates dropping like flies, it seems every eye on campus is fixated on the upcoming presidential election.

But according to 2007 data from the Federal Election Commission, University staff and faculty favored congressional candidates heavily over presidential ones with campaign donations last year.

The Chronicle of Higher Education reported on data from the Center for Responsive Politics and found slightly more than $2 million in campaign donations for Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., from academic professionals this election cycle.

A search of the center’s database shows the University does not fall into this trend.

University data

According to the data, in the first three reporting quarters of 2007, University faculty and staff donated $13,600 to Democratic Senate hopeful Al Franken, $5,800 to Democratic Rep. Tim Walz and $5,000 to Republican Sen. Norm Coleman.

The center’s database includes “all individual contributions to federal candidates, if they gave more than $200,” spokeswoman Massie Ritsch said.

Ritsch also said the data may not be complete because a term like “University of Minnesota” can have many variations within the database, which could mean that some contributions were missed.

Overall, the education industry is the 12th-largest donor to federal politics and has given about $12 million this cycle, he said. Lawyers make up the largest industry of givers at $82.1 million.