Cash on hand (total money raised) for each of the Democratic gubernatorial candidates.

Onorato: $6.5 million ($8.1 million)
Wagner: $675,000 ($757,000)
Hoeffel: $400,000 ($230,000)
Doherty: $94,000 ($450,000)

By Alex Roarty
PoliticsPA Staff Writer
roarty@politicspa.com

Campaign finance reports released Monday seem to definitively separate Dan Onorato from the four-man Democratic gubernatorial field while raising significant questions if the other three candidates can raise enough money to even be competitive.

Combined, Jack Wagner, Joe Hoeffel and Chris Doherty have only about $1 million on hand, six-and-a-half times less than the Allegheny County executive. Onorato has a nearly $6 million cash-on-hand advantage over his closet rival, Wagner.

“Onorato’s are big-league numbers, and the other numbers are varying degrees of the minor league,” said Chris Borick, pollster and Muhlenberg College.

Analysts always expected Onorato, who started with $2 million before even forming his gubernatorial campaign, to have the most money in the field. The $8.1 million he has raised thus far isn’t surprising.

But what might be surprising to some Democrats is the other three candidates’ inability to at least cross the $1 million threshold. Hoeffel, Doherty and Wagner didn’t need to match Onorato dollar-for-dollar, one Democratic insider said, but they did need “to have a pair of jacks or better to open the bidding.”

“To run a major campaign in Pennsylvania … you have to starting to think about having a million a week in TV at some point in the campaign,” said the source, who isn’t affiliated or allied with any campaign. “And there’s only one of those candidates who can contemplate that with a sense of reality at the moment.”

There’s nothing foreseeable in the 15 weeks before the primary that could suddenly give any of the three candidates a fundraising lift, the Democrat said.

“There’d have to be some dramatic event to occur to jump-start the fundraising of one of the three to get them into contention,” the source said.

The fundraising numbers perhaps underscores how much Philadelphia businessman Tom Knox’s exit from the field two weeks ago changed the dynamics of the contest. Knox’s personal fortune would have allowed him to go dollar-for-dollar with Onorato and potentially forced the county executive to run negative ads against him. The Doherty campaign openly speculated the ad war between Onorato and Knox might allow a third, less-well-funded candidate to present himself as an alternative to the two negative candidates.

Now, the poorer candidates might be scrambling for a new strategy.

“Unfortunately, when candidates get numbers like this, it initiates a death spiral,” Borick said. “At this stage in the game, it takes a lot of candidates out of the game.”

Wagner, Hoeffel and Doherty’s fundraisers have to convince donors their candidates are still viable, he said, which won’t be easy given Monday’s finance reports. Contributors want to know they’re getting a good return on their investment, he said.

“How do you convince someone they’re not just throwing money away?” Borick asked.

Of course, the winner of the primary is still far from set, and expectations of a candidate’s inventible nomination have consistently proven premature in recent American political history. A Franklin & Marshall College poll released last week showed Onorato garnering the most support, but only at 10 percent.

Wagner boasts support among many longtime Democratic officials and his successful statewide runs for auditor general have shown him to be a proven vote-getter.

Doherty’s record in Scranton and focus on jobs appears well positioned during a time when voters care almost exclusively about the economy. Hoeffel remains the only candidate from the vote-rich southeast and has a socially liberal record that matches well with many Democrats.

And state Senator Anthony Williams (D-Philadelphia) possible entrance into the race could once again confuse the primary and open the door for another underdog to gain traction and steal the election.

Tags: Chris Doherty, Dan Onorato, Dan Onorato for Governor, Jack Wagner, Joe Hoeffel

This entry was posted on Monday, February 1st, 2010 at 5:42 pm and is filed under PA Reports, PoliticsPA Reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.