McCain's War Chest
by Ryan Sager
Mon, 16 Apr 2007 at 1:06 AM
updated Mon, 16 Apr 2007 at 1:11 AM
John McCain is really setting himself up for a "Comeback Kid" storyline, it seems. How else to explain the fact that after raising less cash than any of his serious rivals for the GOP nomination, he has also managed to burn though a far greater portion of his funds than any of his rivals?
After raising less than $13 million for the primary in the first quarter of 2007 (Rudy Giuliani raised $15 million, Mitt Romney raised $23 million), his campaign reports that it's burned through $8.4 million — nearly three quarters — leaving him with just under $5.2 million cash in hand. The campaign also reports a debt of $1.8 million.
His rivals are in much better shape... (even Chris Dodd has more cash on hand)
Mr. Romney has spent millions more than Mr. McCain (the Romney campaign has been gold-plated, for all its lack of progress), but he has more than twice as much left in the bank.
Mr. Giuliani has spent less than either of his rivals — while maintaining a substantial lead in the polls — and he also has twice as much in the bank as Mr. McCain.
One can speculate as to a number of reasons why Mr. McCain's campaign might have been lackadaisical about fundraising coming into the 2008 campaign season. If one of those reasons was that they were counting on a lot of free campaign work to be done by an adoring Washington press corps, they have perhaps begun to realize the errors of their ways.
The press corps has fallen out of love with John McCain rather rapidly. And even his celebrity status isn't enough to get him much airtime these days. I hate to harp on it, but it calls for harping on: Mr. McCain's attempted campaign relaunch last week (the Iraq war speech down at VMI) was a complete and utter bust. Don Imus and Anna Nicole's baby-daddy crowded it right out of the national consciousness.
What's worst for Mr. McCain is that a slump like this is likely to feed on itself. Very bad first-quarter fundraising figures + extremely bad polling numbers do not = a successful second-quarter fundraising showing. And with no money and all the free media going against you ...
... well, you'd better hope those town halls really do the trick.
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