OK I have to admit that I may have bit off more than I can chew in regards to following the State House candidates October financial disclosures. Here’s the deal, when doing it for congressional candidates I look through 10 reports, to do the same for the house candidates I’m looking through 200, and that’s just the State House candidates. Don’t fret, I did look through them and calculate some rough figures that give us some insight on the key focus for Iowa Republican’s, regaining the majority in the Iowa House of Representatives.
For some reason or another Rants’ report is still not on the Iowa Ethics website. So my over numbers are incomplete, but I still think I’m able to paint a pretty accurate picture. When it comes to State House fundraising the advantage clearly goes to the party that’s in the majority. As an example I’ll use Gronstal’s report (I know he’s in the Senate, but it illustrates my point). Gronstal raised $345,342.00, that’s a lot of coin especially when you see that he raised that with just 264 contributions. That’s an average contribution of over $1300 bucks.
From the numbers I was able to put together it looks like Democrat incumbents were able to out raise Republican incumbents by about a half a million bucks. Now that’s with me making a guess on what Rants was able to raise. Now that’s a significant difference, but to be honest it could be much worse.
One the other hand, the Republican candidates seeking to knock off democrat incumbents or win open seats out-paced their Democrats rivals by well over $200k. Lets look at the candidates I’ve been following.
Jamie Johnson – HD 9
Johnson outraised Rep. McKinley Bailey $52k to $45k.
Scott Belt – HD 100
Belt narrowly outraised Rep. Paul Shomshor $28,800 to $28,750.
Jared Klien – HD 89
Klein is running in Sandy Greiner’s open seat, he out raised his opponent $37k to $14k.
Ross Paustian – HD 84
Paustian outraised Rep. Elesha Gayman $79k to $74k
So there is some reasons to be hopeful, but as I’ve long told you money is important, but it’s not the end all be all in winning a campaign. We also need to recognize that the Iowa Democrat Party does a good job helping their local candidates while Republicans focus on select races and leave the other candidates to fend for themselves.
Other tidbits I discovered while strolling through the financial reports.
1. The Democrats have been rewarded for providing an exception to casinos in regards to the smoking ban. There is a lot of money from casino operators fueling the Democrats election efforts. With their money out of Republican coffers maybe we will take a tougher stand against the expansion of gambling in our state.
2. It seems to me that the way money is being raised for Republican effort has changed in a major way. As I mentioned above, the Republican challengers and candidates in open seats outraised their Democrat opponents. The amount they outraised their opponents is almost exactly the amount a group called “Team Iowa PAC” contributed to their campaigns.
Team Iowa PAC was funded by a who’s who of major Republican donors, and looks to headed by Bruce Rastetter and Nick Ryan. It’s an interesting spin off of bundling that we see in Presidential campaign fundraising. Instead of them giving to candidates individually, they pooled their money and channeled it to some of best places for Republicans to make gains and pick up seats.
Girl Power
While not from the financial reports, there is a new Iowa PAC in the state, Purse PAC. Purse stands for People United for Republican Sisters’ Elections. The only litmus test is that you have to be female, and a Republican.
Their kickoff event drew over 100 women and a few brave men and was a huge success. I think groups like these are critical in growing our Republican bench.
I’ll have more on Latham and Reed in a bit.
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Krusty dear, you know you've long been my favorite political stud muffin, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to disagree with you this morning.
ReplyDeleteIt seems you've only looked at the candidates Cash Raised column in the finance reports.
I strongly encourage you to check the InKind reports. They tell a remarkably different story.
Your comment:
"Jared Klien – HD 89
Klein is running in Sandy Greiner’s open seat, he out raised his opponent $37k to $14k."
Yes, Jarad has out hustled his opponent in the fund raising category. But when you look at the InKind reports, it tells a different story.
The House Truman Fund has dumped $189,063.58 into Larry Marek's campaign,, so the fact that he was only able to raise $14,497.03, (which, btw, most of that money came from OUTSIDE of his district), is totally insignificant.
In contrast, Jarad is showing $77,310.85 on his InKind Report.
So you see, they're making up for a lackluster effort by their candidate with Truman Fund money.
Thanks for letting me set the record straight, Krusty. You're still my favorite, but I'll have to put you on probation if you stumble again.
Sandy Greiner
damn I'm getting smacked around from one of my all time favorites, ouch!
ReplyDeleteSandy makes a good point, and as I noted I'm a little out of my league when it comes to these types of races because they are done differently than say a congressional race.
Across the board when you look at the numbers, the Dems have about a 500k advantage in dollars raised and in-kind contributions.
Krusty
Jarad raised all of that money from PACs and most of it, 28,000 came from ITR and Team Iowa. I'm not sure how much hustling is required to hit those guys up from PACs. In comparison, Marek raised a significant amount of his money in district. If you look back, Marek raised just as much money last quarter whereas Klein raised almost nothing (about $1000) if I remember correctly.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, the House Republicans have really handicapped themselves by letting a candidate as lackluster as Klein parachute into the district this year. ITR and Team Iowa could have sent that money into a number of other competitive districts but ended up having to try to bail out a candidate who was too lazy to raise money for himself.
I think when it comes to hustling, Klein is the one on probation.
Spin it anyway you want to, 11:46, people who want to see the truth can simply go check the reports out for themselves.
ReplyDeleteAnytime a Party dumps an "extra" $100,000 into a race demonstrates they have grave concerns.
Tell us, 11:46, just how many doors has your candidate knocked? Nearly Nada is the answer. He thinks he's entitled to a coronation, FGS! Can't you at least get the guy to go out and pretend to be working for this slot?
No wonder the Truman Fund has coughed up all that money. We'll look forward to hearing your reply during your afternoon coffee break.
Go Jarad Go! He'll make a great state rep!!!
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of money....Mayor Daley just released the $$ Chicago is spending for the Obama post election "victory" rally. 2 Million. Only problem is, that kinda fun money brings a lot of the party krowd out in Chicago and if McCain seems to be winning....you've just gathered 1 million or more of Chicago's finest for a riot that will make 1969 look miniscule!
ReplyDeleteSorry Jarad and Sandy, prepare to get your asses handed to you in a couple weeks. The state of the party is terrible and we are falling apart.
ReplyDeleteJarad has been working hard all summer and into this fall on his campaign and calling him "lazy" is just plain ignorant. I have seen and talked to him on the campaign trail at least two times, and he is coming in to my high school government class tomorrow morning, in fact. I was at the Washington Co. Fair this summer and did not see hide nor hair of Mr. Marek. If you want to talk about who is working harder on the campaign trail, I would not take up that argument in H.D. 89.
ReplyDeleteJarad has out hustled Larry by a mile. A class mate and friend of Larry's, took his Marek sign down from his yard. He changed his mind on the race to Jarad because Jarad had the guts to walk up to his door and talk to him about the issues. Shoe leather still counts in flyover country. I think Jarad has been to almost every home in HD 89th once and he is starting to hit them again for the second time.
ReplyDeleteJared even door knocked while he was on crutches late summer. He is very hardworking. I wish him the very best.
ReplyDeletefrom another candidate trying to win.