Alan Grayson Chides Media for Ignoring His Fundraising Prowess

By: Stephanie Condon
Topics: Campaign 2010

(grayson.house.gov)

Outspoken liberal Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) claims he raised the most money out of all the House candidates in the country in the last quarter of 2009, and he wants everyone to know it.

In a blog post on the progressive Web site FireDogLake and on the Huffington Post, Grayson gives himself hearty praise and chides the media for overlooking his accomplishment.

"The story that everyone wants to tell is that the Democratic Party is disheartened and disintegrating," Grayson wrote. "Teabagger Republicans are juiced up and on top. Or so the media says, over and over again. But the House candidate who raised the most money in the entire country during the last FEC reporting period — $860,000 in three months — is not a teabagger. He is not boosted relentlessly by Fox News. He's not even a Republican. He doesn't think that the Earth was created 6000 years ago, that President Obama was born in Kenya, or that global warming is a hoax."

"I know who he is. Because he's me," Grayson wrote.

Along with the large sum he says he raised, Grayson also highlighted having the largest number of contributors, with more than 15,000. Grayson campaigned, he wrote, "without French-kissing lobbyists, without flattering the idle rich, and without reaching into his own pocket."

Grayson quotes the Simon & Garfunkel song "Sounds of Silence" to describe the lack of media attention his fundraising has received, adding that "the political reporters camped out in D.C. often act like a giant Xerox machine for the fib factory known as the national Republican Party."

The congressman said he has been successful at fundraising "by striking a chord with so many ordinary people."

Grayson has made a name for himself by making brash statements, such as calling Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke a "K Street Whore" and saying in the context of the health care debate, "Republicans want you to die quickly if you get sick."