Friday, February 22, 2008

Obama Was Top Fundraiser At $36 Million For January


The candidates competing to be your next president raised $3.3 million per day last month, according to reports that those still in the running and those who dropped out filed last night with the Federal Election Commission. January brought the field's total haul since fundraising began to $685 million, $586 million of it now spent. With $36 million in January -- the most any candidate has ever raised in a month while still in competitive primaries -- Barack Obama was the top fundraiser, by far. Hillary Clinton came in with about $14 million, plus $5 million from her own pocket. (Had she not lent herself that money, she would have had less to spend going into Super Tuesday than John Edwards.) Republican John McCain collected $12.6 million and reported a total of $5.5 million in loans and other debts. Summary figures for the candidates have been updated on OpenSecrets.org. The Donor Lookup, Fundraising Over Time and State/Metro data are also new. Updates to the site, including categorization of January contributors by industry and employer, will continue into next week as we analyze the data.

*Race for the White House:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/index.asp?cycle=2008

*Look up individual donors to presidential candidates: http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/search_donor.asp

*Fundraising by state and metro area:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/pres_stateAll.asp?cycle=2008

*Fundraising over time:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/weekly.asp?cycle=2008

FUNDRAISING SUGGESTS TIGHT RACE IN OHIO, EDGE FOR CLINTON IN TEXAS

Following the money, you could have predicted how Tuesday's Democratic primaries in Wisconsin and Hawaii were going to turn out -- Barack Obama had a commanding fundraising lead over Hillary Clinton in both states. As for the Republican primary in Wisconsin (the GOP in Hawaii will assign delegates at a convention in May), the top Republican fundraiser last year was Tommy Thompson, the state's former governor, who ended his presidential campaign way back in August. John McCain was the top fundraiser among the remaining Republican candidates. Looking ahead to the next big contests, the fundraising in Ohio suggests a tight race between Clinton and Obama. And McCain was far outraised in the Buckeye State by dropouts Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani. In Texas, Clinton has a wide lead over Obama among larger donors. Both Democrats have raised more in Texas than McCain has.

*Fundraising in Ohio:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/presstatetots.asp?State=OH

*Fundraising in Texas:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/presstatetots.asp?State=TX

*Presidential primary calendar:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/calendar.asp?cycle=2008

CONGRESSIONAL RETIREES THROW THEIR OWN PARTIES

For a group that doesn't plan to run for re-election in November, this year's exceptionally large class of congressional retirees has sure been raising and spending a lot of money. Last year the 26 House and Senate retirees -- almost all of them Republicans -- managed to spend $13.5 million from their campaign accounts and political action committees, or well over half a million dollars each. In some cases, it looks like they're paying for their own extended retirement parties.


*Read the full article:
http://www.capitaleye.org/inside.asp?ID=337

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