Luetkemeyer personal-money total tops $1 million
Luetkemeyer
Republican Blaine Luetkemeyer has dipped $200,000 deeper into his own wallet - increasing to $1.12 million the total in personal funds he’s kicked into his fight to win Missouri’s 9th District Congressional seat.
Luetkemeyer on Saturday donated $200,000 to his campaign according to a report filed Monday with the Federal Election Commission. That’s in addition to $920,000 in personal loans he made previously for the overall primary-general election cycle.
Luetkemeyer has used his own money to remain competitive on the TV and radio ad front with Democratic foe Judy Baker, who has raised far more money than the Republican from contributors.
Pro-Baker independent expenditures also are exceeding pro-Luetkemeyer independent spending, according to FEC reports and interviews with spokesmen for some of the groups.
On the GOP side, Luetkemeyer’s campaign has amassed more than $1.7 million, including the $1.12 million from the candidate himself and about $596,000 from other individuals and committees.
Baker’s campaign has reported raising more than $1.3 million. Her only infusion of personal dollars was a $10,000 loan.
As for independent expenditures, totals include:
Pro-Luetkemeyer: The National Republican Congressional Committee, $612,000.
Pro-Baker: The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, $738,000; Health Care for America Now (affiliated with unions and other groups), $619,000; a credit union group, $150,000; and an American Hospital Association committee, $33,000.
Not being able to raise money suggests that his support is pretty thin. Could be a big surprise on Nov 4th. Good luck Judy!
Judging from the tenor of his campaign ads, I’d say Luetekemeyer is not the kind of guy who is terribly concerned with winning friends and influencing people. Not sure that buying yourself a congressional seat to protect your own bloated wallet is consistent with mid-Missouri values, but I guess we will find out soon enough if others have the same impression of this candidate. Keep your head up, Judy Baker. You are fighting the good fight.
“Not sure that buying yourself a congressional seat …” — Penelope
Only $599 million more and he’ll be comparable to Penelope’s favorite candidate.
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+ vision + leadership + intelligence + talent (both within and available from his closest advisory circle) + plans to create jobs, cut taxes for the middle class, fix a broken healthcare system, shore up education, end energy dependence and free us from the Saudis, extricate us from Iraq. Oh, and another major difference is that Senator Obama’s money came from hard working middle class people like me and not from the Senator’s own piggy bank like Luetekemeyer’s.
If one is to criticize Mr Luetkemeyer for pitching in from his own savings for retirement, etc, one must also criticize Claire who has done it multiple times, and is still the richest Sen. from the Midwest.
Silence.
If one is to criticize the role of $ in politics, one must criticize the highest amount of money raised in the history of the world (!) by Obama, and let us be frank, not from 10$ donors, but from Hollywood , Wall Street and big unions, and in kind contributions, as noted today on the blog roll, from performance-donations, e.g. Ludicris. The media has always repeated the negative mantra that the GOP was a big bankroll party and that in influence of $ in politics was reprehensible–this year we see no stories on that issue nor serious investigations since the Democrats are the party of big money and tricky finance. Logically consistent they are not.
I don’t actually mind when candidates donate money to their own campaigns, I just think it should be a sign of concern for a campaign when you can not raise the funds from your supporters. Obama does not have a problem with raising funds from small time or big time donors. What does it say about Luetkemeyer that he can’t get either?
Correction: Claire second most rich in Midwest, Dem Sen Herb Kohl (WI) is worth more. Claire estimated net worth 32.5 mill good old US greenback $.
Did she buy US Senate office per arguments by some folks?
For what it is worth, top 6 multimillionaire Senators–all dems.
Making $ is not inherently bad, in my opinion, when done honestly, (I have nothing against hard work and success!) but taking $ from Joe the plumber and calling yourself a populist doing it all for the little people back home and for the ‘little workin’ poor guy’ while phoning it in from the land of big bucks is hypocritical in the extreme. Take your own 32 million and put it in the programs you believe in , then I will pitch in my ‘Obama level’ tax rate at 65% - 75% overall as well. Deal?
Penelope,
What has Sen. Obama DONE so far to show us the kind of President he will be? I do not want the talking points from the party. I want to know what you think he has accomplished so far in his life that leads you to believe in him.
He has never lead anything according to his resume’. His advisory circle include Franklin Raines (former head of Fannie), J Wright (his former pastor that hates the US and all that it stands for), Bill Ayres (admitted domestic terrorist and board member of a far left educational fund that has spent over $50 Million dollars on Chicago area public school and they are still failing).
Claire is his whipping girl and while she was endorsing Judy Baker, she said that you can tell a lot about the type of congresswomen she would be by the company that she keeps and has kept in the past. I would then assume that we can say the same about potential President Obama?
Sen. Obama continues to say what he is going to do when he becomes President. In 20004 he campaigned on giving the middle class a tax break. I am middle class and have yet to see the bill that he has introduced to give me or anyone else a tax break. His congressional record is easy to see, as it has very little on it, shows he has voted 94 times to increase taxes. Never once has he voted to lower any taxes on anyone.
I hope that a tiger can change his stripes as his past stripes have shown one thing and his talking points indicate something else.
SCA has it nailed.
“…Obama’s money came
from hard working middle class people like me…” — Penelope
…and middle-class people that find unauthorized credit card charges and illegal c-card contributions from overseas (the Berlin speech pay-off?) and from donors who give in small amounts to exceed the $2,300 max…
Penelope, why do you suppose Obama is not using the industry standard Credit Card Check for donations nor reporting on donations less than $200?
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