Dem House Campaign Unit Gained While GOP’s Drained in February

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Dem House Campaign Unit Gained While GOP’s Drained in February
By Greg Giroux, CQ Staff


The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), which helps fund the campaigns of Democrats who are running for the U.S. House, reported raising $6.2 million in February. That compared to $4.6 million raised by the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), the partisan counterpart to the DCCC, which also filed a campaign report Thursday with the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

The Democratic committee has held a steady fundraising lead since its party’s 30-seat gain boosted it into its current House majority. And the February figures show that the imbalance between the two parties, in terms of money that each House campaign committee had left to spend on races across the nation at the end of last month, grew to its widest yet. The DCCC began March with $38 million left to spend and had $763,000 in debts, compared to $5.1 million for the NRCC, which reported $1.9 million in debts.

The NRCC expected to have had a bit more at the end. But the House Republican organization revised its cash-on-hand total downward by about $740,000, following the results of a preliminary investigation that alleged financial mismanagement by former NRCC treasurer Christopher Ward.

Given their money disadvantage, Republican officials also may wish they had taken back some of the $1.1 million they invested in February on the campaign for March 8 special election in Illinois’ 14th District. Democrat Bill Foster went on to win that contest by 52.5 percent to 47.5 percent over Republican Jim Oberweis — an outcome widely described as a setback and even an embarrassment to the GOP, as the Republican-leaning district had long been held by Republican J. Dennis Hastert, the former House Speaker, who resigned from Congress last November.

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