Pure Horserace: Is McCain Down And Out?
The man who was once the front-runner in the race for the Republican nomination is now struggling to remain in the top tier. John McCain, hobbled by his support for the immigration reform bill that died in the Senate last week, today reported fundraising numbers that will only fuel the perception that his campaign is sinking — $11.2 million raised in the past three months, only $2 million on hand, and salary cutbacks and layoffs throughout his organization.
McCain is "seriously considering" accepting federal matching funds, campaign manager Terry Nelson said after announcing the second-quarter numbers, even though that would require the campaign to abide by certain spending restrictions that would not apply to his opponents.
The numbers are worse than what McCain posted for the first quarter of 2007, the release of which marked the beginning of his fall from the top of the Republican race. Today's news may result in him being seen as trailing not only Rudy Giuliani, but also Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson in the fight for the GOP nomination. Romney and Giuliani have not released fundraising totals yet, and Thompson will not be required to do so until the end of the current quarter in September.
Nelson said McCain's support for a failed compromise on comprehensive immigration legislation was a serious setback for fundraising efforts, and that a previous assumption of raising $100 million in 2007 was far off the mark. "He's taken principled stands that have made him a great leader and a great candidate… but it sometimes makes fundraising more challenging," Nelson said of McCain.
Where does the campaign go from here? Nelson said spending cutbacks — including his own salary for at least two months — were necessary to get McCain's message out, and that both retail campaigning and fundraising efforts would be stepped up. Yet the campaign made similar efforts after a disappointing first quarter, including rolling out the Straight Talk Express bus made famous in the 2000 campaign, and has little to show for it. And, as most of the top candidates are using the week of July Fourth to campaign in key early states, McCain is off the campaign trail, visiting troops in Iraq.
We've seen some pretty unlikely political comebacks before — in 2003, John Kerry was all but written off after he fired his campaign manager, yet came back with a late charge in Iowa to win the Democratic nomination. But McCain faces a steeper climb: his name is literally attached to an immigration bill that is reviled by a good chunk of the GOP base, and while Kerry opted out of matching funds to unshackle his campaign, McCain is headed toward doing the exact opposite. And then there's the compressed primary calendar, which forces candidates to pay to build support and infrastructure in more states than ever before. Recovery, at this point, will prove very difficult. — David Miller
Those Other 2008 Elections: Even as the fundraising numbers in the presidential race are drawing the lion's share of attention, another crucial 2008 race — for control of Congress — is heating up. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the party's fundraising arm for House races, is launching a mix of phone calls and radio and Internet ads targeting 14 Republican incumbents in various districts.
The list includes GOP members who just barely survived in 2006, like New Mexico's Heather Wilson, but also includes targets who are usually considered invulnerable to defeat, like Alaska's Don Young. The ads all revolve around the same issue: support for American troops and veterans.
The early campaign may signal that Democrats, despite Congress' low approval ratings, believe they'll be able to expand on their gains from 2006 instead of focusing mostly on retaining the seats they captured. History suggests that a party will lose some seats in Congress after it makes major gains, but continuing public disapproval of the Iraq war and President Bush seems to have Democrats feeling bullish about the future.
Of course, Republicans probably felt good about their prospects at this point in 2005 — before Hurricane Katrina, continued violence in Iraq, and corruption scandals took hold. And we remember how that turned out. — David Miller
Are You Ready To Rock, Iowa? It's unlikely that Iowa is going to be on the list of concert tour hot spots this summer. But today, and for the rest of the week, the state will host a tour of the Democratic Party's two biggest rock stars: Bill and Hillary Clinton. The jolt that the former president is likely to provide his wife's campaign comes at just the right time — one day after Barack Obama announced he had bested Clinton in second-quarter fundraising.
The "Ready To Change, Ready To Lead" tour (no word on T-shirt availability) begins tonight in Des Moines, where Mr. Clinton will make his first public campaign appearance for his wife since her 2000 Senate campaign in New York. Other spots on the campaign swing include Iowa City, Davenport, Clear Lake, Waterloo, Cedar Rapids, Muscatine, Ottumwa and Fort Dodge.
If you want to see the Clintons but your holiday week plans don't include Iowa, you're not totally out of luck. The power couple's travels throughout the state will be documented on HillCam, available on the Clinton campaign's Web site. A video on the site claims both Clintons will be "reporting directly to you, from Des Moines to Davenport." A press release announcing HillCam promises "spontaneous and unscripted moments."
Will it be worth watching? Maybe, but only if the former president seems more natural than he did in last month's "Sopranos" spoof. — David Miller
Richardson Reaches Out… Way Out: Forget about Obama's $32.5 million fundraising haul — another Democrat, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, may have pulled off something even more impressive: finding a place in New Hampshire where a presidential candidate has never visited.
On an upcoming swing through the Granite State, Richardson will visit tiny Marlow, which claims to have never been touched by the steady stream of presidential hopefuls who have invaded the state every four years for decades. "In an era where campaigns are increasingly dominated by polls, fundraising and political consultants, to have a major candidate like Gov. Richardson come to Marlow boosts my faith in the political process," Mary Blank, president of the Marlow Historical Society, said in a Richardson press release.
Located in southwestern New Hampshire, Marlow had 747 residents as of the 2000 Census — and we're guessing a lot of them will become Richardson fans this week, if only by default. — David Miller
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By David Miller