McCain Camp: Our Budget Is $400 Million

In a conference call this afternoon, John McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, suggested that the campaign will "be looking at a unified budget of over $400 million" when all is said and done.

That "relatively conservative number," he added, will put the campaign "on par with what we believe the potential resources for the Obama campaign is going to be."

Davis said that the McCain campaign and Republican National Committee had $95 million cash on hand at the end of July – $26.7 million for the McCain campaign and $67.8 million for the RNC. (McCain's figure is down from the $31.5 million he had on hand at the end of May.)

He said McCain raised "just over $22 million" in the month of June – more than the candidate has raised in any previous month.

Davis also said that "the McCain campaign spends about $10 million a month less to run their campaign" than Obama, which he suggested has helped the campaign of the presumptive GOP nominee close the cash-on-hand gap on his rival.

Davis added that the McCain campaign has outspent Obama on advertising "just under three to one" since April, a factor he suggested could have helped keep Obama from maintaining a significant head-to-head advantage in national polls following Hillary Clinton's departure from the Democratic race.

Davis' suggestion that the campaign would have a $400 million budget results from his adding together the campaign and RNC's current cash-on-hand, the money he expects will be raised by the two groups' combined efforts from today ($95 million), the $84 million the campaign will get from the Federal Election Commission as a result of public financing, and various other fundraising efforts.

"We anticipate having over $210 million available to us from September up on to Election Day," Davis said. The Republican National Convention will take place at the beginning of September, and it is then, when McCain becomes the official GOP nominee, that he will take the public financing money. (Obama opted out of the public financing system.)

Davis estimated that 40 percent of the funds raised are coming as a result of a direct mail campaign, 20 percent is coming from the Internet, and the rest is coming from major donors. He said that McCain is presently doing about one fundraiser per day, excluding weekends.

Obama's campaign hasn't released his June numbers yet. In May, Obama raised $23.3 million and had $43.1 million on hand.