By now you know that Tom Wolf has the financial advantage in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, given that he is the first candidate on television with a sustained buy. But you may be surprised just how large it really is.
The Wolf campaign released Friday its 2013 campaign finance report. The big total is the $11,804,398 that the campaign has in cash on hand. In total, Wolf raised $13,259,147 which is close to the estimates they announced earlier this month.
His nearest Democratic primary opponent, Treasurer Rob McCord, has $6 million on hand.
The fundraising total was significantly boosted by a $10 million contribution from the candidate himself. Wolf, who helped build his family company in York County into a massive business enterprise, is independently wealthy and pledged when he started his campaign to spend at least $10 million to help finance it.
While Wolf did shell out a lot of money for his campaign, that doesn’t mean he also didn’t have large contributors. M. Thomas Grumbacher, for instance, gave two contributions to the candidate: an initial one for $250, and a bit larger donation of $1,000,000.
A former CEO and current Chairman of the Bon-Ton board of directors, Grumbacher cashed out some of his stock just prior to the contribution. On November 26th, Grumbacher sold 78,696 shares of Bon-Ton stock for over $1.38 mil. On December 6th, he wrote his $1,000,000 check for the Wolf campaign.
George Hodges, the chairman of the board of the York Water Company, chipped in another $200,000.
Additionally, the campaign spent $1,454,749 last year, a large portion of which went to salaries for those working for the campaign. According to the calculations of PoliticsPA, Wolf spent approximately $300,000 on salaries for fourteen staffers (not counting their expenses or outside consultants). About $169,000 of that total was spent on payroll taxes, amounting to around $131K in pay for staff.
The high dollar amount proves one of Wolf’s campaign boasts: he does pay his employees well.
Tens of thousands more went to fundraising consultants, office space, media consultants, and polling.
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9 Responses
@Ron- Don’t hate the player, hate the game!
Don’t we hate buying elections?
Voting AGAINST a guy because he has a beard is just as stupid as voting FOR him because he has a beard.
“Me”-
My initial impression of Wolf was that he was just some rich guy looking to buy his way in too. However, he’s a 1%-er who looks out for and acts like a 99%-er. He went to India to work in the Peace Corp. He’s worked driving a forklift. He profit-shares with his employees.
His money will allow him to get on the air with his message. At that point, the voters can judge for themselves.
We have a good crop of candidates this year, and it would be great for the voters if all of them were able to get their messages out so the people could make an informed choice.
Tom Wolf has been making the right moves. He will be the next Governor of Pennsylvania. McCord missed his boat years ago, and Allyson never turned her front runner status in 2013 into a solid lock. Wolf’s resumé and deep campaign coffers will help him win the race.
I’m not sold on him. I don’t trust people that seek to buy elections for themselves.
I would vote for him over do nothing mccord anyday but that beard will hurt him he will win the amish community lol
What most people don’t know is that he sold his company and when the financial crisis hit he bought that company back for 100 cents on the dollar.
He could have bought that company at a huge discount but he didn’t.
This guy is the perfect dark horse
But he’s got that sketchy beard. No thanks…