An Analysis of Political Contributions by the American College of Surgeons Professional Association (SurgeonsPAC)

In 2001, The American College of Surgeons (ACS) Professional Association launched a political action committee called SurgeonsPAC. SurgeonsPAC donates money to candidates for the United States Congress in an effort to advocate for the interests of surgeons and surgical patients. In this study, we analyzed the political distribution of SurgeonsPAC donations over time and assessed how contributions correlate with candidates' voting records on issues important to the ACS.

We queried OpenSecrets to identify candidates and organizations supported by SurgeonsPAC between 2012 and 2022. We calculated the number of recipients and dollar amounts given to each party overall and in each election cycle. Next, we identified bills on which the ACS lobbied and attempted to identify whether the ACS supported or opposed those bills. Using the Congressional Record, we identified the voting records of congressional candidates receiving SurgeonsPAC support and cross-referenced those records with ACS positions, ultimately identifying the proportion of SurgeonsPAC-funded candidates in each party who supported ACS priorities.

From 2012 to 2022, SurgeonsPAC donated $2,832,000 (57%) to 491 Republican candidates and organizations and $2,097,650 (43%) to 386 Democratic candidates and organizations. SurgeonsPAC donated more to Republican candidates from 2012 to 2018 and more to Democratic candidates in 2020 and 2022. We found that Republican and Democratic recipients of SurgeonsPAC funds voted about evenly on ACS priorities in the Republican-led 115th Congress. Contrastingly, Democrats voted for ACS priorities more frequently than Republicans in the Democratic-led 117th Congress (98.1% versus 29.2%).

Here, we present the first descriptive analysis of SurgeonsPAC distributions over a 10 y period. Greater transparency into which candidates receive financial support from the ACS and how they vote on ACS priorities may help inform the effectiveness of political contributions and incentivize more surgeons to engage in advocacy efforts.