Tag: Fundraising

Republican Congressional $ Numbers

CD 1 – No Repub Filed

CD 2 – No Reports Filed Yet



CD 3 – No Reports Filed yet

CD 4 –

1 – Gardner for Congress

Raised 197,553.40 – Spent 86,386.37 – COH – 383,338.56

2 – Dean Madere – No Report Filed yet

3 – Diggs Brown – No Report Filed yet

4 – Tom Lucero – No Report Filed yet

CD 5 – Lamborn for Congress

Raised 49,079.60 – Spent 28,863.85 – COH – 110,531.82

CD 6 – Coffman for Congress

Raised 105,770.00 – Spent 40,731.31 – COH – 360,917.27

CD 7 –

1. Ryan Frazier for Colorado

Raised 218,824.00 – Spent 60,345.98 – COH – 280,355.38

2. Lang Sias – No report filed yet

Democratic Congressional $ Numbers

I am tossing them up

CD 1 – Diana Degette for Congress

Raised 98,421.38 – Spent 94,687.97 – COH 84,553.27

CD 2 – Friends of Jared Polis

Raised 72,771.88 – Spent 29,516.12 – COH 120,250.31

CD 3 – John Salazar for Congress

Raised 187,160.00 – Spent 61,000.41 – COH 847,099.45

CD 4 – Not Filed yet

CD 5 – No Dem running yet

CD 6 – Flerlage for Congress

Raised 19,329.00 – Spent 13,490.62 – COH 23,556.44

CD 7 – Perlmutter for Congress

Raised 215,201.30 – Spent 82,473.39 – COH 1,045,319.11

Roxanne Conlin’s campaign for U.S. Senate released partial fundraising numbers yesterday, and they are impressive:

Total cash raised (Nov. 2 – Dec. 31):

$603,575.44

Cash on hand:

$502,832.84

Total individual donors:  1,649 (1,395 Iowans/85% Iowans)

Online supporters signed up:  Over 31,000

Donations $100 and under: 1,332

Donations $250 and under: 1,433

All of Conlin’s campaign contributions came from individual supporters, because she has pledged not to accept contributions from federal lobbyists or PACs. (I wouldn’t have advised her to take that stance, because there are PACs and lobbyists fighting for good things as well as those working against the public interest.) In any event, she has shown that she can raise enough money to staff and run a statewide campaign. Conlin is about a third of the way through a 99-county tour she began earlier this month.

I haven’t seen year-end fundraising numbers from Senator Chuck Grassley yet. At the end of the third quarter of 2009, he had more than $4.4 million cash on hand, so clearly he will still be way ahead in the money race. During the third quarter, when Grassley played a high-profile role in health care reform negotiations, he raised $864,622 total, of which $364,295 came from political action committees.

In other words, Conlin raised more from individual donors in two months than Grassley raised from individuals during the third quarter. That’s a strong pace, and it suggests a lot of Iowans are motivated to take the fight to Grassley. Conlin has already raised nearly five times as much as Democrat Art Small spent during his entire 2004 campaign against Iowa’s senior senator.

I don’t have new fundraising numbers from the other Democrats running against Grassley. Bob Krause raised $7,430 during the third quarter, ending with $3,493 on hand. Tom Fiegen raised $3,781 during the third quarter, ending with $519 on hand. I like many of the statements I’ve heard from Krause and Fiegen, but they have yet to show that they will be able to run a statewide campaign, and therefore appear to be extreme underdogs leading up to the Democratic primary in June. Neither Krause nor Fiegen seems likely to drop out of this race, however. On the contrary, Fiegen called on Conlin to quit the race last month, saying Republican attacks on her would divert attention from Grassley and the “needs of working families.” Yesterday Krause criticized one of Conlin’s tax credit proposals.

Grassley will be very tough to beat. His approval rating has fallen but is still above 50 percent, and he has set a goal of raising $9 million for this race. Even if Democrats don’t manage to defeat Grassley, giving him a spirited challenge is well worth the effort. Driving up turnout among Democrats whom Grassley has alienated can only help our candidates down-ticket.

UPDATE: Rasmussen conducted a one-day poll of this race on January 26. Grassley leads Conlin 59 to 31, Krause 59 to 26 and Fiegen 61 to 25 (margin of error 4.5 percent).

Yesterday Republican front-runner Terry Branstad’s campaign released some information about its fundraising during the last three months of 2009. As I’d feared, they reported big numbers: nearly $1.55 million raised, with $1.36 million cash on hand left at the end of 2009. You can make a lot of contacts in four terms as governor, and Branstad’s campaign had 3,044 individual contributors, representing all of Iowa’s 99 counties. The campaign also noted that 94 percent of the money raised came from Iowans, and 96 percent came from individuals.

Governor Chet Culver’s campaign responded by announcing that it has $2.59 million on hand:

That total is over $1 million more than any incumbent governor has had at a similar point in their reelection cycle. […]

Over the past 12 months, the campaign received contributions from well over 1,000 donors, 85% of which are Iowa residents.  Additionally, more than half the contributions made to the campaign were for $250 or less.

Culver campaign manager Abby Curran told me that the total amount raised during 2009 was $2.145 million. She declined to tell me how much the campaign spent during the year, but it’s not hard to arrive at a ballpark figure. Last January, Culver’s campaign reported having about $1.5 million on hand. Adding $2.145 million to that and subtracting the $2.59 million the campaign has on hand now suggests that the governor’s campaign spent a little more than $1 million during the past year.

I’ve been concerned about the Culver campaign’s burn rate for a while. It appears that as in 2008, the campaign spent roughly half of what it took in during 2009. Presumably a lot of that money went toward running this statewide television ad in October and this one in November. I liked the ads, especially the second one, and I understand why they wanted to spread a positive message when the governor was going through a rough political stretch. But Culver and Jim Nussle raised about $15 million combined during the 2006 campaign, and this year’s race will be more expensive. The Democratic and Republican governors’ associations are likely to spend substantial money here (both organizations have a lot of money in the bank). Even so, Culver needs to raise a lot more money.

Another point of concern is that Branstad has more individual donors. If half of Culver’s donations were for $250 or less, then the overwhelming majority of his money came from donors giving several thousand dollars. Iowa has no campaign contribution limits, so there’s no reason these people couldn’t give again, but Culver has a smaller pool of past donors to tap. In my opinion this reflects the governor’s failure to build strong coalitions and deliver on various issues of importance to Democratic activists who supported Ed Fallon or Mike Blouin in the 2006 primary. The friction between him and organized labor hasn’t helped either.

The good news for Culver is that he can continue to build his war chest while Branstad is forced to spend a lot of money during the Republican primary.

Speaking of which, the other Republican candidates for governor haven’t released their fundraising numbers yet. They must file reports with the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board by January 19, so we’ll know more next week. I assume State Representatives Chris Rants and Rod Roberts will have very little cash on hand, and Bob Vander Plaats won’t have nearly as much as Branstad reported. But Vander Plaats should be able to announce a credible number. At this point in the 2006 election cycle he had raised nearly a million dollars. Thanks to the Iowa Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriage, Vander Plaats received much more publicity among social conservatives nationwide last year than he had in 2005.

Any thoughts about the Iowa governor’s race are welcome in this thread.

An omnibus of some of the early-bird fundraising numbers we’ve seen reported so far:

AR-02:

     Tim Griffin (R): >$250K raised

FL-08:

     Armando Gutierrez (R): $210K raised + $100K personal donation; $300K CoH

KY-Gov:

     Steve Beshear (D-inc): $542K raised; $784K CoH

NC-Sen:

     Cal Cunningham (D): $320K raised (since December)

ND-AL:

     Earl Pomeroy (D-inc): $360K raised; $1.4M CoH

NH-Sen:

     Bill Binnie (R): $225K raised + $1.26M loan

NH-02:

     Ann McLane Kuster (D): $206K raised; $550K CoH

NY-01:

     Randy Altschuler (R): $185K raised + $450K loan; $776K CoH

     George Demos (R): $300K raised; $275K CoH

PA-07:

     Pat Meehan (R): $580K raised

     Bryan Lentz (D): ~$300K raised; $450K CoH

TN-08:

     Roy Herron (D): >$425K raised + $250K loan; $675K CoH

     Steve Fincher (R): $320K raised

VA-05:

     Laurence Verga (R): $11K raised + $227K loans/personal donations, $218K CoH

VA-11:

     Keith Fimian (R): $500K CoH

WI-Gov:

     Tom Barrett (D): $750K raised; $1.5M CoH

Money can’t buy me love. Here are the November fundraising numbers for the six major party committees (October numbers are here):

We’ve added a new column to the chart, “CoH Change.” This just shows how much each committee’s cash-on-hand moved from the prior month, whether positive or negative. As you can see, the RNC spent a ton.

It ain’t easy bein’ cheesy. Here are the October fundraising numbers for the six major party committees (September numbers are here):

It’s not yet known how much the DNC spent last month (UPDATE: Now it is – see chart), but it had to have been a hefty amount; note that, despite their strong $11.5M month, the committee’s cash-on-hand actually dipped by about $2.5M over September, and that their corresponding debt was only lowered by about $600K. (UPDATE: Here’s something I forgot to take note of: this is the first time, all year, that the DNC has had more cash-on-hand than the RNC. Nice.)

As for the NRCC, fundraising continues to be their weak link. Despite having the wind at their backs in terms of the national climate, the committee only has $4M in the bank. Compare that to money the DCCC had in their coffers in November 2005 ($10.7M) and November 2007 ($29M). House Republicans who aspire to take back the Speaker’s gavel next year have reason to be concerned with such a sluggish pace.

A few questions have come up about the FEC’s so-called “48-hour reports.” They’re actually pretty simple. From a PDF on the FEC’s website:

Who Must File FEC Form 6

Principal campaign committees must file 48-hour notices on contributions of $1,000 or more received after the 20th day, but more than 48 hours, before 12:01 a.m. of the day of any election in which the candidate participates. …

When to File

FEC Form 6 must be received by the federal and state (where required) filing offices within 48 hours after acampaign’s receipt of any contribution of $1,000 or more received after the 20th day, but more than 48 hours before, the date of any election in which the candidate participates.

The candidates in NY-23 have been filing 48-hour reports since the close of the reporting period for their “pre-special” fundraising reports, Oct. 15th. But because the 48-hour reports have to be filed very quickly, all three campaigns had already posted a bunch of them before they were required to file their pre-special reports. We gathered those numbers in the right-hand column of the chart in this post.

As you can see from the link, Bill Owens was already kicking ass in this department as of last Thursday. But since then, the disparity has grown much, much greater. Both Owens and Hoffman have each filed three new 48-hour reports; Scozzafava, by contrast, has filed just one. The overall tally is therefore no surprise:

     Owens:   $73,100

     Hoffman: $43,100

     Dede:    $ 2,000

Now, these reports only cover big ($1,000+) donations, so I suppose it’s possible that Dede is raking in a lot of last-minute small-dollar checks. But I tend to doubt that. One thing we do know for sure is that Republican members of Congress – who seldom write checks for less than four figures – have all but forsaken her. Fewer than twenty have given to her so far, and none in her final hour of need. Meanwhile, by my count, over sixty have given to Owens, and many more than once – giving money via campaign committees and leadership PACs, and making donations for 2009 and 2010. This flow has continued unabated – just yesterday, Rep. Joe Crowley’s PAC threw down another $5,000, and Rep. Charlie Gonzales came in for $2,000.

I’m not sure even Obi Wan Kenobi could help Scozzafava now – not that he would.

The three candidates running in NY-23 have all just posted their pre-special FEC reports, which covers the period from July 1st to Oct. 14th. Owens has crushed Scozzafava and Hoffman:

Note that Hoffman made a $102K loan to himself, and Scozzafava loaned herself $12K. The final column refers to the so-called “48-hour reports” that campaigns must file shortly before an election. These disclosures fill the gap between the last date covered by the final report (which I’ve detailed above) and election day. Owens has also been lapping the field on this score, too. The fact that Scozzafava’s 48-hour reports are weaker than Hoffman’s – and the fact that she has less cash-on-hand – signal some dire times for her down the stretch run.

It ain’t funny money. Here are the September fundraising numbers for the six major party committees (August numbers are here):

After two months of trailing the NRSC in fundraising, the DSCC stormed back with a big month, putting a lot of distance between them and the GOP in the cash-on-hand pile. Perhaps the best bit of news, though, is that thanks to a strong July, the DNC outraised the RNC in the third quarter – the first time that’s happened in a quarter since 2Q 2004. So that you can see these numbers for yourself, below I’m also included a 3Q summary chart, with overall party totals at the bottom.

Here’s our summary of FEC filings for the quarter that ended on September 30, for the hot (and not-so-hot) Senate races. (House filings are here.) These numbers come courtesy of Quinn McCord at the Hotline. The left column is total receipts for the second quarter. (This is based on slightly different criteria as “total raised” from the House list, which only counts donations – see Quinn’s post for the full explanation.) The right column is current cash on hand. All dollar amounts are in thousands. Click on table headers to sort.

The totals are blank for several prominent names on this chart. Some (like Jennifer Brunner) simply declined to provide the Hotline with their data. Others have not yet formally announced & presumably haven’t met FEC reporting thresholds yet.