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Biggest Fundraising Winners: Consultants
by Jeff Koopersmith
March 21, 1997 -- NEW YORK (APJP) -- Surprise, surprise!
As usual, the Federal Election Commission was late in reporting tremendous increases in political fundraising and spending yesterday.
Where have they been hiding? Don't they read the papers? Are their numbers really a reflection of total spending on politics in America last year?
Well, no -- not really.
The Republican Party raised a lot more than Democrats. Totals for national, state and local GOP party committees were $555 million for the season 1995-96. According to the FEC, $415 million was in "hard money" contributions, which are spent directly on congressional and presidential elections. Democrats raised less than half -- $222 million -- less, of course, the few million they are returning to "suspicious" donors.
"Soft money" figures were huge as well. These funds cannot be spent directly on campaigns and are supposed to be used to promote the parties themselves. Here the Democrats still trailed Republicans: Newt and the boys raised $138 million and Bill and his boys raised $124 million.
Totals were near $1 BILLION!
This is good news for political consultants, who get to spend all this money on radio and television time and are left to pocket around $200 million in fees (a 20% fee average.)
However, the whole story is "not here told."
Remember those "independent" campaign committees? Those are the ones that raise their own money and spend it to deliver a message. Of course, most of those messages are aligned to one party or the other. No good numbers exist yet for these expenditures, but estimates show that at least another couple of hundred million was spent here. Added to this is the money that's never reported. The "street" money is still in vogue in many parts of the country -- cash paid to people to vote, to tear down yard signs and small billboards, and generally to get people elected.
So what does this all mean? In truth, not much. It looks like pols spent $3-5 per capita to get their various messages to the less-than-50% of Americans that actually vote.
That's chicken feed. I wonder what General Mills pays to attract you to their soggy cereals?
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1997, 1996, American Politics Journal Publications, Inc. 
