In Iowa, one of this year's White House hopefuls is outspending his rival by $700,000 on television advertising. In Missouri and Wisconsin, the same contender leads by half a million. In Ohio, the gap is $1 million, while in Pennsylvania, it's even larger: $1.5 million. And in Nevada and New Mexico, the candidate in question currently holds a whopping two-to-one advantage over his opponent in on-air investments.
His name: John McCain.
For all the pundits who predicted that Democratic nominee Barack Obama would crush McCain in the general-election money race, this should come as something of a surprise. After all, Obama raked in a record-breaking $280 million during the primary season; McCain's receipts totaled a measly $120 million. But as the last few months of federal fundraising disclosures have shown, "the real surprise" of this year's cash chase--as I wrote on July 11--is that "it's much more competitive than anyone expected." And the latest numbers are no expection.
While Obama netted a massive $51 million in July--again clobbering McCain, who racked up $27 million--the important statistic to look at is the combined amount of cash-on-hand for each candidate and his party (i.e, how much is actually available to spend on getting the nominee elected). In this case, the totals are nearly identical: the Republicans finished July with $96 million in the bank ($75 million for the RNC, $21 million for McCain) versus $94.3 million for the Democrats ($25.8 million for the DNC, $65.8 million for Obama). Bottom line: neither candidate is struggling financially.
That said, a tied race is better news--at this point--for McCain than it is for Obama. Why? Because on Sept. 4, the Republican nominee--who opted into the public financing system--will receive a check from U.S. taxpayers for $84.1 million. Obama won't. Going forward, this gives McCain two advantages over his Internet-fueled rival from Chicago. For starters, he's free to spend his entire savings ($21 million) plus his entire August fundraising haul (another $25 million or so) before the Republican convention; that $45 million kitty, which can't carry over into the general election, dwarfs Obama's estimated budget for August (about $30 million). That's why McCain has been clobbering Obama on the airwaves in an array of battleground states.
Secondly, for the final two months of the campaign, McCain will be able to stop detouring from the trail to attend private fundraisers, relying instead on $42 million a month in public funds plus an estimated $130 million from the RNC to see him through. In other words, McCain will have far more money after Sept. 4 than he's ever had before--and he won't have to work for it. Obama, meanwhile, will still have to step off the stump for glitzy fundraisers like this week's $7.8-million bashes in San Francisco if he hopes to continue raising $50 million a month--which is what he'll need to keep up.
The big question, of course, is whether McCain's surprising cashflow will actually help him get elected in November. So far, the signals are mixed. According to RealClear Politics, McCain has built slight leads over Obama in three of the swing states where he's invested more heavily in TV: Ohio (1.5 percent), Nevada (three percent) and Missouri (2.3 percent). But in the other four target states--Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Iowa and New Mexico--he still trails by at least five percent and shows no signs of gaining. As Evan Tracey, the chief operating officer of TNS Media Intelligence/Campaign Media Analysis Group, told TPM Election Central earlier this week, "the concern for McCain is that he's outspending Obama... but not building any real leads in these states."
On the other hand, the DNC's war chest is significantly smaller than the RNC's, so Obama will likely wake up on Sept. 4 trailing McCain by more than $80 million. ($84 million in taxpayer funds + $80 million in RNC savings = $184 million for McCain, while $50 million in campaign funds + $30 million in DNC savings = $80 million for Obama.) There's no doubt that the Illinois senator can more than make up that gap in the two months before Election Day, especially by tapping early, maxed-out donors for a quick infusion of general-election cash. Whether it's good for his campaign to be grubbing for money while McCain spends his time appealing directly to voters--that could be another story.
UPDATE, 7:47 p.m.: It's worth remembering, as reader not.Brit does below, that the RNC's funds won't be spent solely on McCain and that Obama is investing heavily in the "ground game"--voter registration, turnout efforts, etc. That said, the massive money gap between McCain and Obama simply never materialized, and it will be Obama, not McCain, who has the most ground to make up this fall. (Especially given that the RNC's turnout machine is already a proven commodity.) Bottom line, though: this election won't be decided by who has the most money--it'll be decided by how that money is spent. Whether Obama's efforts to expand the map outweigh McCain's largely negative messaging remains to be seen.
