Who Pays for America's Biggest Conservative Gathering?

On Thursday, several thousand conservative activists from across the country will swarm the National Harbor convention center near Washington for a three-day affair that will feature most of the potential Republican candidates for president, from Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina to Jeb Bush and Scott Walker.

The story of how the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, mushroomed from a small, informal gathering of the right into a multimillion-dollar can't-miss pageant for the Republican Party is reflected in its corporate sponsors. It's underwritten by the National Rifle Association, the Heritage Foundation, the Trump Organization Inc. and the Motion Picture Association of America in addition to much more modestly moneyed religious and small-government interest groups.