Obama raises $45 million in February for campaign, DNC

WASHINGTON – President Obama has stepped up his fundraising pace, amassing $45 million for his re-election and the Democratic National Committee in February before a likely spending spree by Republican outside groups in the general election, his campaign announced Monday.

By Saul Loeb, AFP/Getty Images

President Obama appears at a Democratic campaign fundraiser in Bellevue, Wash., on Feb. 17.

By Saul Loeb, AFP/Getty Images

President Obama appears at a Democratic campaign fundraiser in Bellevue, Wash., on Feb. 17.

The haul outpaces the $29.1 million Obama raised for himself and the Democratic Party in January. It still trails what he collected at this point four years ago as he made his first bid for the White House. Republicans called the lag a sign of voter weariness with Obama and the nation's economic struggles.

Obama made the fundraising announcement in an early-morning tweet, thanking the 348,000 people who donated last month. The campaign said nearly 98% of the contributions were $250 or less, and the average donation was about $59.

The fundraising news comes before campaign filings with the Federal Election Commission and another important test for the president's Republican rivals — Tuesday's primary in Obama's home state of Illinois.

"Every dime the Republicans are raising will be spent on the air carpet-bombing each other," Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt said. "Our funds are a direct investment in our general election infrastructure on the ground."

Combined with his fundraising for the Democratic Party, Obama has collected about $300 million for the entire election cycle. In February alone, he headlined 15 fundraisers in California, Florida and Washington, according to data compiled by Brendan Doherty, a U.S. Naval Academy political scientist who tracks presidential activity.

The aggressive pace shows no signs of slowing. Last week, Obama attended five fundraisers on a single day - including an event with singer Cee Lo Green in Atlanta and another at the home of movie producer Tyler Perry, where attendees paid $35,800 each. Monday afternoon, he appeared at another $35,800-a-head event at the high-end W Hotel in downtown Washington.

Republicans note that Obama raised less this February than the $56.8 million he raised in February 2008 amid his fight with Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic nomination. Republican National Committee spokeswoman Kirsten Kukowski said Obama "is having a hard time convincing voters he deserves another term."

Obama's campaign did not disclose how much money went into his campaign account directly in February vs. accounts shared with the national party.

He has consistently outraised the Republicans vying to replace him. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who leads the GOP field in fundraising, announced collecting $11.5 million in February. Former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum collected $9 million last month. Other GOP candidates have not released full details of their February fundraising; those reports are due to the Federal Election Commission by midnight Tuesday.

Overall, Republican candidates have raised far less than GOP presidential contenders at this stage in the 2008 election. Instead, they have relied heavily on new super PACs that can raise and spend unlimited money.

In Illinois, a pro-Romney super PAC had spent $2.6 million as of midday Monday, more than eight times the spending by a super PAC aligned with Santorum.

For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.

View the original article here

Barack Obama campaign announces $68 million raised with DNC (The Ticket)

Jim Messina, campaign manager for President Barack Obama's re-election effort, announced in an online video early Thursday morning that the campaign has raised some $68 million in conjunction with the Democratic National Committee over the past three-month cycle of fundraising. But while Messina touted the Obama operation's big-money gains, he also put in an appeal for additional financial support from Obama backers.

"Too many Obama supporters think we don't need their money, or [that] they don't need to give it now," Messina said. You can watch the video below:

Messina highlighted the large number of first-time donors--200,000 in the fourth quarter of 2011-- and noted that the support from Americans who've never before contributed to the campaign signals enthusiasm on the Democratic side.

Overall, the fourth-quarter total was still less than the Obama Victory Fund and the Democratic National Committee reported raising together in the third quarter ($70 million) or in the second quarter ($86 million).

Other popular Yahoo! News stories:

• Video: Michael Steele on candidates' attacks on Romney: 'inconsistent' with GOP principles

• Ron Paul to New Hampshire: 'We are dangerous to the status quo'

• Jon Huntsman claims 'solid, comfortable, confident position'

Want more of our best political stories? Visit The Ticket or connect with us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, or add us on Tumblr.

Handy with a camera? Join our Election 2012 Flickr group to submit your photos of the campaign in action.

View the original article here

Obama, party allies raise $68 million for re-election (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama's re-election campaign and its Democratic allies raised more than $68 million in the last three months of 2011, dwarfing Republican rivals as the White House race approaches.

In a video message sent to supporters on Thursday, Obama's 2012 campaign manager Jim Messina announced the haul, which brings the shared fundraising by Obama's campaign and the Democratic National Committee at over $200 million for 2011.

With most of that money said to be coming in small-dollar sums from thousands of Americans, the fundraising gives Obama, a Democrat, a nice cushion as he campaigns for re-election against Republicans sparring to see who will be their nominee in November's election.

Although the money given to the DNC is effectively Obama's for grabs, his own campaign -- which faces lower contribution limits -- received $42 million during the last three months of 2011.

Still, that far outstrips the amounts donated to the Republican campaigns, which do not yet receive financial backing from the Republican National Committee.

Front-runner Mitt Romney's campaign said on Wednesday it had raised $24 million in the fourth quarter. Ron Paul raised $13 million and Newt Gingrich raised $9 million.

The Obama team is shooting to top the roughly $750 million it raised when he was elected president in 2008.

Much of Obama's success in 2008 was credited to his grassroots support illustrated by small donations, which Messina said continue to flow. Similar to the previous quarterly report, 98 percent of the donations to Obama's campaign were made up of $250 or less, he said.

In the video, Messina again rejected the expectation that the campaign would raise $1 billion. That false expectation, he said, was giving donors the misimpression Obama did not need their financial support.

"Too many Obama supporters think we don't need their money, or they don't need to give now," he said in the video.

"We won in 2008 because every single supporter and volunteer viewed their role in this campaign as absolutely essential to us winning. But now we're in danger of letting that very belief slip through our fingers this time."

One major campaign donor highlighted the financial challenge Obama faces from "Super PACs," the groups that technically cannot directly communicate with campaigns but can accept unlimited donations in support of a candidate.

"The race is going to be expensive. The fact is that there are these unlimited buckets of (Republican) PAC money," he said.

"The Obama campaign is going to need money from here for the duration. And once (the Republicans) have a nominee, that's when it starts getting expensive."

Some 1.3 million Americans gave to Obama's campaign last year, including 583,000 donors in the fourth quarter alone. Of those, almost a third were first-time donors, Messina said.

The campaign beat its goal of raising $60 million in the fourth quarter, although the amount brought in was just under $70 million raised in the third quarter. Through the end of September, the campaign and the DNC had raised roughly $155 million.

Messina's email to supporters asked them to chip in $25 now; often Obama fundraising appeals start with a much lower $3 donation request.

The campaigns have until Jan 31 to release their full fourth quarter reports.

(additional reporting by Eric Johnson in Chicago and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Editing by Philip Barbara)

View the original article here