Advice to the Republican National Committee: Quick…get on the phone and call News Corp for some money: it turns out you only had $5 milliion left by July’s end for the final sprint of the 2010 mid-term elections:
The Republican National Committee spent twice as much as it raised in July, leaving the committee with just over $5 million on hand with less than three months left before the 2010 midterm elections.
In a report filed with the Federal Election Commission this evening, the RNC showed $5.5 million raised and more than $11 million spent — including $1.5 million in transfers to state party committees — last month. The committee ended July with $5.3 million in the bank and $2.2 million in debt.
The Democratic National Committee raised and spent $11.6 million in July, including nearly $4 million in transfers to state parties. The DNC ended the period with $10.8 million. The DNC had $3.5 million in debt.
The dismal report comes less than a month after RNC Treasurer Randy Pullen accused Chairman Michael Steele of hiding $7 million in debts; the RNC filed amended reports in July detailing $3 million in previously unreported debts.
The RNC’s money woes have become a point of significant concern for some party strategists who have fretted privately — and publicly — that the committee’s financial standing could affect the party’s ability to capitalize on an election cycle shaping up to be a very good one for the GOP.
In case anyone had any doubt about it, Steele is history once the mid-terms are over. If the GOP doesn’t do as well as expected, look for there to be calls for his political scalp. If the GOP does well, some will say it was despite Steele.
In either case, he is as likely to be re-elected as it is for News Corp to give $1 million to the Democrats.
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.