Don’t think former House Speaker Newt Gingrich will go way quietly. His PAC just got a $5 million donation:
Casino mogul Sheldon Adelson has given $5 million to an independent committee supporting GOP presidential aspirant Newt Gingrich, the first of what is expected to be many millions the Las Vegas billionaire plans to spend this election year.
The check from Adelson is the latest in an avalanche of campaign cash flooding the presidential season to independent groups known as Super PACs The check was cut on Friday to Winning Our Future, a group run by former Gingrich associates, according to two people close to the donor.
Actually, a $5 million donation from a casino donor to Gingrich is not all that surprising.
If you look at the current Republican presidential field, it does conjure up the word “craps.”
Or perhaps the singular.
A person close to Adelson said that the billionaire planned to spend at least another $5 million during the campaign — either to the Gingrich-linked group or to the winner of the Republican nomination for president — and that the initial check was intended to keep Gingrich competitive in the Jan. 21 South Carolina primary.
A spokesman for Adelson said in an e-mail, “At this time I’m going to decline to comment.” Rick Tyler, a spokesman for the PAC, said, “I am not commenting on any donations at this time.” Under the law, the Gingrich campaign is not supposed to be notified of such donations because the PAC is independent.
One person close to Adelson said that more money could go to the Super PAC depending on “how Newt does in the South Carolina primary, which is presumed to be Newt’s last stand.” Until the past week, Gingrich had been leading in polls in South Carolina, but the most recent surveys have put former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney ahead in the Palmetto State.
Last month, Politico reported that Adelson told people he planned to write a $20 million check to the group. Adelson and his spokesman denied the report. A longtime Republican donor, Adelson is limited by campaign laws on how much he can give directly to a candidate’s campaign. He and his wife have already given the maximum allowed, $2,500 each.
What this does is give Gingrich a louder megaphone.
And just look at how well he has used a smaller megaphone…
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.