Republican Governors Flex Their Fundraising Muscle

By Chris Cillizza and Zachary A. Goldfarb
Sunday, October 15, 2006

Casting aside its traditional image as a minor player in campaigns, the Republican Governors Association raised $8.5 million over the past three months and has now raked in $20 million in 2006 alone.

The RGA's haul from July 1 to Sept. 30 eclipsed the group's previous three-month fundraising record, set in the first quarter of this year, by more than $2 million. The association also passed its total yearly record for fundraising ($18 million) in the first nine months of the year. The Democratic Governors Association raised $5 million in the period and has collected nearly $14 million this year, roughly $1 million short of its all-time high.

Phil Musser, executive director of the RGA, said his organization has received several seven-figure checks from individuals, including Texas home builder Bob Perry, a major financial backer of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the group that attacked Democratic nominee John Kerry in 2004.

Gov. Mitt Romney (Mass.), the RGA chairman, has also tapped his vast fundraising network to benefit the group and leaned heavily on a handful of fellow governors, including Sonny Perdue (Ga.), Matt Blunt (Mo.) and Haley Barbour (Miss.).

"No one has worked harder than Mitt Romney to ensure the financial success of RGA," Musser said. "The results speak for themselves."

Until 2002, the RGA relied on the Republican National Committee's largess to fund its activities. The groups split after the passage of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, which banned the RNC -- but not the RGA -- from accepting large checks from individual contributors.

Since the split, the RGA has operated independently of the national party, making donations directly to campaigns as well as funding ads in individual states.

To date, the RGA has funded political ads in Ohio, Michigan, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Nevada, Maine and Alaska; made major contributions to third-party groups in Colorado, Iowa and Arkansas; and directly contributed to candidates in seven states.

New Ad Questions a Silent Bush

A new, well-funded Democratic group looking to make a difference in the final weeks of the campaign has aired its first television advertisement.

The September Fund, a "527" group founded by Democratic Party operative Harold Ickes, plans to spend $10 million this fall. Last week its ad went up on CNN, and Erik Smith, the fund's president, said that spot and several others are going to air over the weekend in Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky and Iowa.

The ad begins with a man who stands in a park looking at a bush and asks, "So, what's our exit strategy from Iraq?"

The ad shuffles through people talking to the bush: "Why do our soldiers have to keep dying? What about affordable health care?"

One man with a cane says, "Can't we support stem cell research?"

"Why did we let down Katrina victims? Why won't Congress do anything?"

A male narrator says, "Okay, it's kind of ridiculous to think you're ever going to get an answer from this bush," with the camera on the green bush. Then a close-up picture of President Bush is displayed. "But it's also kind of ridiculous to think you're going to get an answer from this one."

In orange letters, "Demand Answers" and "Vote for Change" appear, with the September Fund noted at the bottom.

John Geer, a professor at Vanderbilt University who specializes in political advertising, questioned whether the ad would be effective. "It raises lots of good questions, but equating President Bush with a shrub -- it's pretty hard-hitting, but I'm not sure so many people will want to think of the president, whether they agree or disagree, as a plant," he said.

McCain vs. Clinton and Clinton

The verbal sparring between Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) took a malicious turn yesterday, forcing the New York senator to apologize for words attributed to an unnamed adviser who had denigrated McCain to the New York Times.

Earlier in the week, McCain had come to President Bush's defense after Clinton challenged the administration's record on North Korea. McCain said that Democrats should not blame the Bush administration and that President Bill Clinton's administration failed in North Korea.

Someone in the Clinton camp raised the ante, telling columnist Maureen Dowd that in defending Bush, McCain, who was a prisoner of war in Vietnam, looked "similar to the way he did on those captive tapes from Hanoi, where he recited the names of his crew mates."

That remark, published yesterday, appeared to resurrect some of the worst moments of the 2000 presidential primaries, when a whisper campaign against McCain suggested that he might be mentally unstable because of his POW experience. The quotation drew a swift rebuke from McCain's chief adviser, John Weaver.

"It goes without saying there are no expectations that the Clintons, their spokespeople and their allies know much about Vietnam," he said in a statement. "But for one of Senator Clinton's aides to lie about John McCain's time in a North Vietnamese prison camp is beyond disappointing. There was no such tape recording, though he did once 'give up' the starting lineup of the Green Bay Packers while under extreme duress."

Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson distanced the senator from her unnamed adviser's remarks, saying, "These comments are reprehensible, and they in no way reflect Senator Clinton's feelings."

Clinton reached McCain by phone and apologized, Weaver said, adding that McCain accepted the apology and considered the matter over.

Staff writers Dan Balz and Kari Lydersen contributed to this report.