It’s usually an ominous sign when a campaign says, “We’ll release our fundraising totals only when the law tells us to.” When it’s said after the other candidate releases theirs, it usually signals something just ain’t right, raises the specter of internal trouble, causes the press to constantly ask and speculate.
Thursday, Barack Obama’s campaign said during March it raised $40 million, which when added to the $55 million he raked in during February, is eye-popping. In the wake of Obama’s announcement, the Hillary Clinton campaign originally said it would not release it’s totals until April 20, the deadline to do so as required by the Federal Election Commission. Uh-oh. My original guess was the fundraising total was paltry and potentially embarrassing for the Clinton campaign when compared to Obama’s. Then later in the day, someone leaked the total ($20 million) to the press.
Now, a 2-to-1 margin in fundraising can make you think Obama’s dominating the money game, but keep in mind the juggernaut Ron Paul was and that didn’t translate into votes. And Obama far outspent Clinton in Ohio and Texas.
Reports this morning, though, make Clinton’s situation look much worse than it does on the surface. You’ll see the Intelligencer Journal reported Clinton having $33.1 million in available cash at the end of February, but as I’m reading today, it’s actually much less.
As Andrew Romano of Newsweek points out, even though Clinton raised $34.5 million in February, she has only $11.7 million designated for the primary election, which suggests that Clinton did not expand her donor base. Why? Because individual donors are limited to $2,300 contributions for the primary, which means if they want to give again to Clinton they have to pour cash into her general election coffers, not her primary war chest. Consider that at the end of February, she was $8.7 million in debt, which means she had only $3 million in available cash. That’s a miniscule total for a presidential campaign where you could end up spending $1 million a day in television ads and gas for the tour bus and so on.
We truly don’t know how much of the $20 million is designated for the primary election. We won’t until April 20. The question is: Are donors still seeing Clinton as a worthwhile investment?
As for Obama, he started March out with $31.6 million in on-hand cash for the primary, and during the next 31 days 218,000 people donated to his campaign for the first time.
I’ll reiterate this point: a candidate wins an election, not money. Clinton proved that in previous primaries, and she’s still polling better than Obama in Pennsylvania. It’s the longterm campaign, however, where it’s going to be difficult to match Obama in advertising and the ability to travel to rallies and townhall meetings. And there’s no more crucial stretch for the survival of Clinton’s presidential aspirations than what we’re heading into right now.
