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Mitt Romney Raises $14.2 Million In Third Quarter…To Rick Perry’s $17 Million

by Tommy Christopher | 3:25 pm, October 14th, 2011

» 14 comments

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney continues to see evidence of reluctant support from conservatives, as his third quarter fundraising total of $14.2 million fell well short of Texas Gov. Rick Perry‘s $17 Million take, despite the fact that Perry didn’t announce his candidacy until halfway through the period, and now languishes far below Romney in the polls. Meanwhile, newly-minted frontrunner Herman Cain hasn’t announced his Q3 numbers yet, but told CNN’s Erin Burnett that his campaign will announce “several hundred thousand dollars in cash on hand.”

As Cain noted, though, his campaign has had very little time to take advantage of his rocket ride in the polls, so his eventual Q3 total might not be a very accurate indicator of support.

Romney’s opponents might see the disparity between Romney’s and Perry’s totals as validation of a message that they’ve been delivering for some time, the reluctance of conservatives to hop aboard the good ship Romney. Former Obama spokesman Bill Burton released yet another memo today underscoring that theme:

What’s the matter with Romney?

Rick Perry’s sudden decline and Herman Cain’s concurrent surge reinforces an important point about the primary: Republican voters are still desperately shopping for an alternative to Romney. While he may well end up the nominee, it is only because their voters will have exhausted all other options.

The memo goes on to cite data that shows, not only the flurry of lead-changes this year while Romney’s support stayed essentially flat, but also that Romney’s favorables haven’t gone up since 2008, and that Romney supporters are most likely to change their minds about their candidate.

The fourth quarter could be a different story for Romney, though. Unless Rick Perry somehow manages to quickly turn around his slide in the polls (unlikely after yet another poor debate performance this week), many of the donors who have been hanging back, or hedging with Perry, could move into the Romney column. While Herman Cain will doubtlessly do well with small donors, the big establishment money will probably line up against his upstart candidacy, as convincing them that he can beat Barack Obama is an impossibly heavy lift.

Of course, all of this Republican fundraising news happens against the backdrop of a Barack Obama reelection campaign that raised over $70 million in the third quarter, but which will also face an unprecedented amount of opposition from independent groups, with no limits on donations, and no duty to disclose their individual donors.

When it comes to the influence of money in politics, I agree with most of what this guy says (except maybe the spending caps; I’m not a pinko!)

2012 Election, fundraising, Herman Cain, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry

Exgoper

Mitt back before he was a serial flip-flopper. Good times.
http://twitter.com/BarneyFranken Barney Franken

I cant see anything wrong with what Romney is saying here, so long as it is isn’t in violation of the first amendment…so does that mean that I am to the left of TOMMY CHRISTOPHER on campaign finance reform?

Or is Tommy just a serial asshole with a pathological need to disagree with a republican in some capacity?
http://twitter.com/BarneyFranken Barney Franken

Tommy, if you are going to have a strangely photoshopped picture of Romney with dollar bills stuffed into his pockets for raising 14 million, what would a picture of Obama look like when in the same period he raised 70 million?
http://Mediaite.com Jon Nicosia

That is a real picture
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_LDO6LIQBI2JQ4Q5MWLWBKGKSJY bensanity

What did Paul raise? Gingrich? Bachmann? Santorum? Incomplete reporting like this is a shame.
Bob

Perry is Phil Gramm ’96 Part II – a guy who gets boatloads of money from big business, but has yet to figure out that his campaign has already imploded with the base and that no one likes him.
TomT

It doesn’t matter. The teabaggers are stuck with Mitt Romney, like vaginal herpes to a prostitute.
S R Karenova

I tell you Republicans. Ann Coulter is right. Run Romney. You lose. Obama will successfully paint him as a political sleazeball who will do anything to win. Perry is a lousy candidate, but he can raise money. You better hope he brings Romney down so someone else can win otherwise it’s Obama another four years.
S R Karenova

You’re too generous. Even though Phil Gramm was a terrible “economist” whose plans for financial deregulation were disastrous for this country he could at least speak intelligibly. Rick Perry is another dumb, lightweight Republican like Sarah Palin whose stupidity makes you embarrassed.
Exgoper

“Rick Perry is another dumb, lightweight Republican like Sarah Palin whose stupidity makes you embarrassed.”

Unless you’re a social conservative, in which case it makes you proud!
Anonymous

Fact: Perry is right about jobs and full out energy policy for America!
Anonymous

I’m sure Rick Perry is a nice, good ole boy from West Texas, but he isn’t smart enough to be presidernt. Some tend to forget that the Governor of Texas job is nothing more than a figurehead with little to do except appoint people to commissions and sell “Texas” as a place to relocate to other USA businesses.
Anonymous

Obama is on track to raise 1 billion in campaign funds but, it won’t matter. The 2012 election will be a vote on his idology and the American people have seen enough of that and his crooked administration. He hasn’t fulfilled any of his promises. Ending the wars, Closing Gitmo, Putting people back to work and government transparency,His supporters paid no tax. G.E., I.B.M., Verison and others. He approved bad loans to Solyndra & Sun Power after he was warned against making these loans. The tax payers take a back seat to bankruptcy awards, that goes to investors.Tax payers get nothing.That’s illegal. Carter was competent compaired to this guy. Government transparency, We have to approve this bill before we know whats in it, brilliant.This president and his administration will go down in history as the worst and most corrupt ever.
Anonymous

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