Democratic Funding Fades

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Wall Street Journal:

WASHINGTONA late effort by Democrats to match record fund raising by conservative organizations has come up short, leaving the party more reliant than usual on the campaign efforts of labor unions.

A key pro-Democratic group, recently created by top party insiders to build a "firewall" around the Democrats' majority in the House, said Thursday it hoped to raise $10 million. That's a fraction of the $50 million that an alliance of GOP groups said Tuesday they would spend to help Republicans in dozens of House races.

"We are David vs. Goliath," said Ramona Oliver, a spokeswoman for the new Democratic group, called America's Families First Action Fund. Founded this summer, it began raising money after Labor Day to help counter Republican fundraising efforts. It once hoped to help protect up to 30 Democratic House seats, but is now focusing on just 18 campaigns, Ms. Oliver said.

In total, outside conservative groupssuch as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Action Network and American Crossroadscould spend more than $300 million on TV advertisements, campaign mailings and other efforts to elect Republicans to Congress this year. Outside Democratic groups, by contrast, plan to spend about $100 million on those activities. The largest labor unions say they will spend $200 million combined, but most of their focus will be on rallying union voters.

The spending by outside GOP groups is key because in the last three election cycles Democratic outside groups have substantially outspent their GOP rivals.

Overall, the Democratic party and its candidates still have more money at their disposal than their GOP rivals. In the closest 40 House and 12 Senate races, the Democratic candidate, on average, has twice as much money in the bank as the GOP opponent, according to the most recent fund-raising data. That's in part because many are incumbents who can more easily raise big money in advance of the election.

But among outside campaign organizations, Democrats are being outgunned, helping erase the Democrats' overall financial advantage. This lets Republicans inject money into races where Democrats had a big cash advantage, leaving Democratic candidates more reliant on the get-out-the-vote activities of the largest labor unions.
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Unions and dead people are pretty much all the Democrats have left...