Marco Rubio actually raised just $5.7 million in the quarter. This may seem a minor difference, but the amount the campaign claimed is a 5 percent inflation of the actual amount. Rubio’s cash-on-hand, however, wasn’t $11 million, but $9.5 million, around 15 percent less than reported and less than Jeb Bush. Rubio’s spending was double the amount spent by Carly Fiorina, who raised some $1 million more than Rubio and is roughly in the same polling position. Rubio’s spending is almost the same as Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who raised more than twice the amount Marco did.
by Mike Flynn18 Oct 2015, 11:25 AM PST0
The challenge involved in the Jeb Bush quest for the White House is perfectly encapsulated in a new poll of Pennsylvania by Public Policy Polling. At -35, Jeb Bush has the worst favorable rating of any candidate for President, including Hillary Clinton.
by Mike Flynn16 Oct 2015, 10:45 AM PST0
Donald Trump’s campaign collected $4 million in the third quarter, roughly the same as Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Trump himself contributed $100,000 to the campaign in the third quarter. The more interesting fact, though, is that almost 75,000 people also sent his campaign money, with an average contribution of $50, without any fundraising outreach, solicitation, or even obvious way to do so.
by Mike Flynn16 Oct 2015, 6:33 AM PST0
Jeb Bush’s campaign announced late Thursday that it had raised just $13.3 million in the 3rd quarter period from July to September. The amount, which was about $7 million short of the GOP money leader, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, was a precipitous drop from his 2nd quarter fundraising.
by Mike Flynn15 Oct 2015, 1:22 PM PST0
Ahead of its required disclosure of third quarter fundraising, the Jeb Bush campaign says it is cutting back and being more frugal in its campaign spending. With the upcoming report, the last bit of Bush’s inevitability argument is likely to evaporate.
by Mike Flynn15 Oct 2015, 6:06 AM PST0
Carly Fiorina capitalized on her strong first debate performance, raising $6.8 million in the third quarter. Her impressive total beat out Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, long considered a formidable candidate by Republican party insiders. Rubio’s fundraising disappointed in the July-September period, raising just $6 million.
by Mike Flynn14 Oct 2015, 6:23 AM PST0
Hillary Clinton is very weak in a general election match-up. In the new Fox poll, she loses to every potential Republican candidate. She trails Trump by 5 points, Ben Carson by 11 points, Jeb Bush by 4 points and Carly Fiorina by 3 points. This is not in the Democrat script for the general election. Hillary Clinton, in fact, could be the first Democrat candidate in recent memory who has to actively campaign for the female vote.
by Mike Flynn13 Oct 2015, 6:18 PM PST0
Donald Trump continues to lead the race for the GOP nomination with 27% support, according to a new CBS poll released Sunday. His support is unchanged since early September. Ben Carson is second and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz has moved into 3rd place. Jeb Bush has faded into a tie for 5th place.
by Mike Flynn12 Oct 2015, 8:43 PM PST0
While the specific reasons prompting McCarthy to drop out of a race he was expected to win are murky, the aftermath has brought another round of concern-trolling from the media and displayed, for all to see, a national political party that is hopelessly out of touch with its voters.
by Mike Flynn10 Oct 2015, 12:11 PM PST0
Billionaire Google Executive Eric Schmidt hasn’t contributed directly to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, but the savvy tech mogul as found a more meaningful way to support her efforts. Schmidt is the angel investor behind The Groundwork, a new data mining firm under contract with the Clinton campaign.
by Mike Flynn9 Oct 2015, 11:49 AM PST0
According to the FEC, Marco Rubio ended the second quarter fundraising period with $10 million in the bank. If the $11 million reported by his campaign is accurate, then the $6 million raised over the last three months only added around $1 million to his campaign war chest for the Fall. This would indicate that the campaign spent almost every dollar it raised between July and September.
by Mike Flynn8 Oct 2015, 7:49 PM PST0
Kevin McCarthy’s decision throws the search for a new House Speaker into chaos. It also, temporarily at least, blocks movement on a planned reshuffling of the House Republican leadership team. McCarthy had indicated that he plans to remain as Majority Leader. The next few days, and his explanations for his withdrawal from the Speaker’s race, will determine whether that remains on option.
by Mike Flynn8 Oct 2015, 1:47 PM PST0
Hillary Clinton’s new positioning also, however, puts her on the opposite side of President Obama on several major issues. Her fears of a Joe Biden candidacy for the nomination are rekindling the Obama-Clinton war from 2008.
by Mike Flynn8 Oct 2015, 7:43 AM PST0
As in other states, real estate developer Donald Trump and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson win the top spots among Florida Republicans. Trump continues to lead the field with 28 percent support, up 7 points from August. Carson is second with 16 percent support. It is noteworthy that Trump’s support among Florida Republicans is more than Rubio and Bush earn combined. This is not how major candidates normally poll in their home states.
by Mike Flynn7 Oct 2015, 6:59 AM PST0
Pity the poor folks at satirical periodical The Onion. It is increasingly hard to parody everyday life when reality has become an electric kool-aid acid test. On Monday, purported news site Politico brought its self-reported sharp political analysis to bear by analyzing the grammar of Facebook commenters for various Presidential candidates.
by Mike Flynn6 Oct 2015, 8:34 PM PST0
If Democrats are already trailing in the Hawkeye State with Hillary as their standard-bearer, they face a much more difficult task keeping the White House. And a new NBC/WSJ poll of Iowa finds presumptive Democrat frontrunner Hillary Clinton trailing all Republican candidates tested in the poll. Democrats have carried Iowa in 5 of the last 6 presidential contests.
by Mike Flynn6 Oct 2015, 8:03 AM PST0
White working class voters make up an huge chunk of the electorate, but are strangely ignored by most politicians. Although they occupy very different parts of the political spectrum, uber-capitalist Donald Trump and socialist Bernie Sanders are making overt populist appeals to bring this long neglected voting bloc into their ranks.
by Mike Flynn6 Oct 2015, 6:06 AM PST0
The third quarter fundraising period for presidential campaigns is over, having closed Wednesday. Detailed numbers won’t be publicly available until later this week, but campaigns are free to report their results at any time. More than any other candidate, Jeb Bush needs to report a strong fundraising quarter to quell growing doubts about his campaign.
by Mike Flynn5 Oct 2015, 10:47 AM PST0
In just 8 months, Hillary Clinton has given up more than 30 points of support to Sanders and Biden. This collapse has come while she was the prohibitive favorite for the nomination and amassed a large campaign war chest and an enormous campaign organization.
by Mike Flynn4 Oct 2015, 3:31 PM PST0
It is no accident that Dr. Ben Carson is enjoying one of his biggest lifts in the polls as the media are was savaging him for views that offended them. It is a formula that has upended the GOP nomination fight.
by Mike Flynn4 Oct 2015, 10:05 AM PST0
The Department of Labor reported Friday that the economy gained just 142,000 jobs in September. The number was well below economists’ predictions of a 200,000 monthly gain.
by Mike Flynn2 Oct 2015, 6:10 AM PST0
GOP candidate Ben Carson’s campaign reported raising an impressive $20 million in the third Quarter reporting period. His take is double the amount raised in the second Quarter, powered by thousands of small dollar donations. Carson’s fundraising total has provided a yardstick to measure the other campaigns. That is, if they choose to report any numbers before they are made public next week. If the other campaigns don’t report any numbers, well, that too will tell us a lot.
by Mike Flynn2 Oct 2015, 4:47 AM PST0
Hillary Clinton supporters may dismiss polls showing a surging Sanders as an aberration of early polling, but Sanders’ money haul is much harder to explain away. Considering the fact that Sanders has a much smaller campaign operation, as David Axelrod conjectured on Twitter, he may actually have more cash-on-hand for the next phase of the campaign than Clinton. A large number of maxed-out donors to Hillary may now give money to Sanders, if only to hedge their bets.
by Mike Flynn1 Oct 2015, 9:50 AM PST0
The $100 million the Chamber plans to spend this cycle is close the triple the amount the group spent in 2012, when President Obama was running for reelection. In 2014, when the Chamber launched its effort to attack conservatives in primaries, the group spent close to $70 million.
by Mike Flynn1 Oct 2015, 8:30 AM PST0
Speaker John Boehner’s surprise announcement that he will retire from Congress at the end of October has put most of the House legislative work on hold. A possible showdown this week over federal funding for Planned Parenthood has evaporated as the House grasps with new leadership elections scheduled for next week.
by Mike Flynn30 Sep 2015, 9:43 AM PST0
