With three Democrats lining up for a chance to unseat him, Pat Toomey’s re-election campaign is blowing his competition out of the water in the money game.
The junior Senator pulled in $1.89 million over the last three months of 2015, almost twice as much as the Democratic Party’s “preferred candidate” Katie McGinty’s campaign managed.
After picking up $168,000 in his first few weeks in the race, Braddock Mayor John Fetterman’s campaign lost a bit of steam, raising $10K less during the fourth quarter of 2015. Joe Sestak raised $373K and now has $2.58 million in cash on hand.
Top-Line Numbers
Toomey brought in $50K less than it did in the third quarter of 2015 and spent $854,088 – just half of what it spent in Q3 – as he looks to stockpile for the general election.
The first-term Senator pulled in money from 183 PACs and businesses in Q4, who have contributed an average $6,768 this election cycle.
Toomey, who has been labeled one of the most vulnerable incumbents, now has $9.58 million in cash to spend on retaining his seat in the U.S. Senate.
Contributions
Toomey picked up over 700 large ($1,000+) individual contributions in Q4, picking up particularly strong hometown support from the Lehigh Valley. 23 donors in Bethlehem kicked in $70,114, while 21 Allentown supporters donated $63,247.28.
60% of Toomey’s large donors in Q4 were from the Keystone State.
27 New York, New Yorkers chipped in over $80K, 27 in Pittsburgh contributed $72,731 and 14 Philadelphians donated more than $45K. Toomey also found solid support in West Chester, Villanova, Easton, Reading, State College, Wayne, and Bryn Mawr, picking up more than $20K from each town.
Toomey also picked up monetary support from several of his fellow Congressmen, including Lou Barletta, Bill Shuster, Pat Meehan, Joe Pitts and Charlie Dent.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee is backing Toomey to the tune of $46,800, while the Senator also boasts four joint victory committees with donations of at least $33K from each.
Several businesses have a particular affinity for the junior Senator: 8 employees from Kohlberg Kravis & Roberts gave $33,400; 7 AmerisourceBergen employees gave $21,700; and 9 employees from Pfizer gave $19,100, while the Pfizer PAC contributed another $2K.
Expenditures
Though Toomey’s campaign spending was down 50% from Q3, he still outspent McGinty by more than $150K.
Toomey spent $233K on mailers and postage and another $16K on FEC compliance.
Consulting costs reached $256K in Q4, with Harris Media LLC ($76,219), LVH Consulting ($73,048) and Red Sea LLC ($66,178) picking up big paychecks from Toomey’s campaign.
The Lehigh Valley lawmaker paid $21,085 to St. Paul, MN-based FLS Connect and $16,770 to Bethesda, MD-based Basswood Research for telemarketing and polling.
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5 Responses
Bob-
“There is a reason Donald Trump is winning.”
Yes. The Republican primary voters are idiots who can’t tell their asses from holes in the ground. But, to be fair, none of the GOP choices (besides Kaisich) are even remotely in touch with reality either.
It will be interesting if Trump gets 1/3 the delegates and Cruz/Rubio each get 1/4, and they team up to beat Trump for the nomination.
You are correct (shocking) that Dem strength has grown a bit since the last time. But, you are wrong that Toomey isn’t “conservative enough” for the Republicans. If he was any further to the right, he’d fall off his chair.
He’s a well-funded incumbent who has managed to fool a lot of independents into thinking he’s moderate/reasonable. He’ll be able to dominate the airwaves with his own message.
He’s vulnerable because it’s a presidential year with good Dem turnout. The question is whether the Dems are smart enough to vote straight ticket.
Pat Toomey is highly vulnerable. In the year of the Outsider Republican, Pat Toomey has entwined himself with the Republican Establishment. At this time, Pat Toomey is the only Republican to hold statewide office in Pennsylvania. However, he is vulnerable because he has chosen to betray and abandon those who supported in 2004 when he first challenged Liberal Arlen Specter and he has betrayed and abandoned the fiscal and social conservatives, the Tea Party, in particular, who elected him in 2010.
In 2010, Pat Toomey defeated Democrat Joe Sestak by 80,229 in the election where Republican Tom Corbett defeated Democrat Dan Onorato 357,975 – a difference of 277, 746. Since 2010, the better organized and much more skilled Democrats have been steadily winning statewide office by wider and wider margins; -the stunning sweep of all five statewide Appellate court contests was the latest real world example of Democratic strength.
Pat Toomey has chosen to ally himself Gleason Asher Establishment, an incompetent team of self-serving losers whose network of crony consultants enrich themselves by losing elections.
Money will not remedy Pat Toomey’s erosion of support in the Republican. I am not alone in thinking this. I think any Democrat can defeat Pat Toomey. He or she needs only enough money to get the message out. The statewide Democratic operatives are more than competent and financed to do that. Lesson: Do Not Betray and Abandon Your Base. There is a reason Donald Trump is winning.
Fetterman’s first quarter only covered two weeks of fund raising, so he’s effectively raised over $300,000 in a single quarter. Not too shabby when you consider he’s up against the establishment of Ed Rendell and the entire state and national party.
I think the Fetterman campaign made a big mistake announcing two weeks before the new quarter.
Can’t Toomey find any political consulting firms in PA to give this work to?
(same goes for the other candidates)
It would be nice to spend all those millions here in PA.
And as we’ve seen with JEB!, a boatload of money won’t help you survive if your candidate can’t swim.