11:19PM EDT October 25. 2012 – WASHINGTON — Republican Mitt Romney and allied party committees out-raised President Obama by more than $20 million during the first 17 days of October, figures released Thursday by their campaigns show.
Romney and the Republican Party took in nearly $112 million, while Obama and the Democratic Party collected $90.5 million.
That time period coincides with the first two presidential debates and the vice-presidential debate, when Romney started rising in the polls after losing ground following the party’s conventions. It reverses momentum Obama picked up in August and September, when the president’s monthly fundraising outstripped Romney’s.
Romney, his campaign and linked party groups had $169.1THmillion in cash available for the final push to Election Day, as the campaigns move into a period of non-stop stumping, relentless attack ads and get-out-the-vote efforts.
The Obama campaign did not indicate how much money he had stockpiled but touted its reliance on small-dollar donors, via Twitter on Thursday evening.
His campaign said it had drawn support from more than 4.2 million donors since announcing his re-election in April 2011 and more 1.2 million had contributed between Oct. 1 and Oct. 17. The average contribution: $46.92. “Every five bucks helped,” the campaign said on Twitter.
Slightly less than a third of the individual contributions directly to Romney’s campaign came from donors who gave $200 or less. About a third of the cash available to Republicans for the election homestretch remained in Romney’s direct control.
“There are less than two weeks left, but we still have much hard work to do to ensure that Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan win in November and bring real change to Washington,” Romney finance chairman Spencer Zwick said in a statement.
The announcement came as candidates and super PACs filed their final fundraising reports before Election Day with the Federal Election Commission.
Those filings show that Restore Our Future, a pro-Romney super PAC, raised more than $20 million during the first two weeks of October and had more than $24 million in the bank for the remaining weeks of the campaign.
This week, the super PAC unleashed $17.7 million in advertising to help Romney in several swing states.
Billionaire casino owner Sheldon Adelson and his wife, Miriam, donated a combined $10 million to the super PAC, records show.
Other $1 million donors to the group include Texas industrialist Harold Simmons.
Adelson also gave $1.5 million to a super PAC aiding Republican George Allen in his Virginia Senate battle with Democrat Tim Kaine, and $1 million to a group backing the re-election of Rep. Allen West, a first-term Republican from Florida.
The Adelsons also donated $1 million to the Ending Spending Fund, a super PAC created by TD Ameritrade founder J. Joe Ricketts. Ricketts’ group has spent more than $4 million in recent weeks on anti-Obama advertising, mailing and door-knocking.
In recent days, the Obama and Romney camps have claimed momentum.
Romney said in a fundraising e-mail sent Thursday that his debates with Obama have “supercharged” his campaign.
Contributing: Catalina Camia and Ray Locker
Source:
http://www.news.ezonearticle.com/2012/10/26/romney-outraises-obama-by-21-million-in-october/
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