Monday, April 24, 2006
House Fundraising Trends
This one took a while. Inspired by Polinaut's recent post on the cost of votes and in-state campaign fundraising, I decided to go ahead and grab what data I could from the cited website, and put together some numbers.
In 2004, all 134 State Representatives were up for re-election. The results are well-known by now - the MN GOP hemorrhaged seats, coming very close to losing their rock-solid majority with a final count of 68-66 in favor of the GOP.
In light of the DFL's gains in the State House, here are the fundraising totals for winning DFL candidates and their opponents. If you're counting, you'll notice that some are missing - these represent the four DFL reps that ran unopposed. The opponent numbers represent their leading Republican opposition in the general, as only seven Independent or Green candidates raised more than $10,000.
Note the position of the fourteen bolded names - those of the "New DFLers", those who contributed to the DFL's tremendous gain in the state's lower legislative chamber. Their position at the top of this list denotes the competitive nature of their fundraising efforts in 2004 - as a percentage of their GOP opponents' fundraising efforts, these Representatives (and current incumbents) are most likely to face competitive efforts from the GOP in 2006, looking to exploit the combination of non-presidential-year low turnout and a competitive fundraising environment.
One obvious counter to this is the result of each of these candidates' elections - even if they were outraised by their GOP counterpart, the DFL candidate got more bang for the buck. Fundraising is not everything - much depends on the personality, style, and political acumen of the candidate/Representative. But off-cycle elections are funny creatures. The current split in the House is not the DFL's high-water mark - the way I look at it, if the DFL has a Senator in a district, there should be little reason why it can't have at least one State Rep there as well, especially in the increasingly blue West Metro. Supporting each of these fourteen first-time incumbents and pushing competitive candidates like Will Morgan, Shelley Madore, John Benson, Jeremy Kalin, and others over the top could bring a DFL legislature to bear on the real issues facing Minnesota today.
In 2004, all 134 State Representatives were up for re-election. The results are well-known by now - the MN GOP hemorrhaged seats, coming very close to losing their rock-solid majority with a final count of 68-66 in favor of the GOP.
In light of the DFL's gains in the State House, here are the fundraising totals for winning DFL candidates and their opponents. If you're counting, you'll notice that some are missing - these represent the four DFL reps that ran unopposed. The opponent numbers represent their leading Republican opposition in the general, as only seven Independent or Green candidates raised more than $10,000.
| DFL Winning Candidate | Amount Raised | Opponent Raised | DFL $ as % of GOP $ |
| DORN, JOHN - 023B | $14,249 | $30,348 | 47% |
| POPPE, JEANNE - 027B | $24,734 | $46,764 | 53% |
| LIEDER, BERNIE L - 001B | $29,677 | $54,834 | 54% |
| LIEBLING, TINA - 030A | $38,762 | $58,766 | 66% |
| HORTMAN, MELISSA - 047B | $34,830 | $49,064 | 71% |
| KOENEN, LYLE - 020B | $28,726 | $38,267 | 75% |
| JUHNKE, AL - 013B | $27,375 | $35,449 | 77% |
| FRITZ, PATTI - 026B | $42,807 | $55,420 | 77% |
| SIMON, STEVE - 044A | $84,162 | $90,843 | 93% |
| MOE, FRANK - 004A | $41,510 | $42,447 | 98% |
| HUNTLEY, THOMAS - 007A | $26,753 | $26,327 | 102% |
| RUUD, MARIA - 042A | $37,050 | $35,254 | 105% |
| SCALZE, BEV - 054B | $38,530 | $36,482 | 106% |
| JOHNSON, RUTH - 023A | $39,041 | $36,900 | 106% |
| SAILER, BRITA - 002B | $37,608 | $35,272 | 107% |
| HOSCH, LARRY - 014B | $33,191 | $30,920 | 107% |
| HILTY, BILL - 008A | $18,613 | $17,225 | 108% |
| HANSEN, RICK - 039A | $34,868 | $32,010 | 109% |
| PETERSON, SANDRA - 045A | $55,531 | $44,822 | 124% |
| WELTI, ANDY - 030B | $36,405 | $27,108 | 134% |
| GREILING, MINDY - 054A | $34,546 | $25,706 | 134% |
| LILLIE, LEON M - 055A | $33,481 | $23,666 | 141% |
| WAGENIUS, JEAN - 062B | $19,268 | $12,855 | 150% |
| JOHNSON, SHELDON - 067B | $23,129 | $14,964 | 155% |
| OPATZ, JOE - 015B | $20,172 | $12,838 | 157% |
| SLAWIK, NORA - 055B | $39,915 | $23,973 | 166% |
| HILSTROM, DEBRA - 046B | $27,621 | $15,774 | 175% |
| LARSON, DAN - 063B | $32,520 | $18,077 | 180% |
| EKEN, KENT - 002A | $37,520 | $20,409 | 184% |
| SOLBERG, LOREN A - 003B | $31,951 | $17,275 | 185% |
| PELOWSKI JR, GENE - 031A | $32,315 | $16,144 | 200% |
| CARLSON, LYNDON R - 045B | $39,870 | $19,786 | 202% |
| THISSEN, PAUL - 063A | $45,063 | $22,131 | 204% |
| MURPHY, MARY - 006B | $22,142 | $10,603 | 209% |
| PETERSON, AARON - 020A | $45,452 | $21,610 | 210% |
| MARQUART, PAUL - 009B | $28,845 | $12,295 | 235% |
| DITTRICH, DENISE R - 047A | $99,360 | $42,212 | 235% |
| OTREMBA, MARY ELLEN - 011B | $31,476 | $13,090 | 240% |
| MARIANI, CARLOS - 065B | $16,724 | $6,928 | 241% |
| LATZ, RON - 044B | $38,364 | $14,754 | 260% |
| HAUSMAN, ALICE - 066B | $26,220 | $9,998 | 262% |
| GOODWIN, BARB - 050A | $33,001 | $12,204 | 270% |
| BERNARDY, CONNIE - 051B | $57,354 | $18,935 | 303% |
| ELLISON, KEITH - 058B | $20,646 | $6,592 | 313% |
| PAYMAR, MICHAEL - 064B | $27,782 | $8,534 | 326% |
| SERTICH, ANTHONY (TONY) - 005B | $27,475 | $8,233 | 334% |
| ENTENZA, MATT - 064A | $34,049 | $9,822 | 347% |
| LENCZEWSKI, ANN - 040B | $45,471 | $12,947 | 351% |
| RUKAVINA, TOM - 005A | $41,091 | $11,213 | 366% |
| DILL, DAVID - 006A | $60,760 | $15,886 | 382% |
| MAHONEY, TIM - 067A | $28,507 | $6,572 | 434% |
| SIEBEN, KATIE - 057A | $43,935 | $9,766 | 450% |
| MULLERY, JOE - 058A | $32,304 | $6,795 | 475% |
| HORNSTEIN, FRANK - 060B | $43,909 | $8,205 | 535% |
| NELSON, MIKE - 046A | $31,936 | $5,625 | 568% |
| ATKINS, JOE - 039B | $83,508 | $13,781 | 606% |
| LESCH, JOHN - 066A | $26,913 | $3,994 | 674% |
| LOEFFLER, DIANE - 059A | $31,716 | $2,210 | 1435% |
| KAHN, PHYLLIS - 059B | $24,852 | $1,200 | 2071% |
| THAO, CY - 065A | $13,739 | $425 | 3233% |
| CLARK, KAREN - 061A | $30,417 | $425 | 7157% |
| KELLIHER, MARGARET ANDERSON - 060A | $43,480 | $426 | 10207% |
Note the position of the fourteen bolded names - those of the "New DFLers", those who contributed to the DFL's tremendous gain in the state's lower legislative chamber. Their position at the top of this list denotes the competitive nature of their fundraising efforts in 2004 - as a percentage of their GOP opponents' fundraising efforts, these Representatives (and current incumbents) are most likely to face competitive efforts from the GOP in 2006, looking to exploit the combination of non-presidential-year low turnout and a competitive fundraising environment.
One obvious counter to this is the result of each of these candidates' elections - even if they were outraised by their GOP counterpart, the DFL candidate got more bang for the buck. Fundraising is not everything - much depends on the personality, style, and political acumen of the candidate/Representative. But off-cycle elections are funny creatures. The current split in the House is not the DFL's high-water mark - the way I look at it, if the DFL has a Senator in a district, there should be little reason why it can't have at least one State Rep there as well, especially in the increasingly blue West Metro. Supporting each of these fourteen first-time incumbents and pushing competitive candidates like Will Morgan, Shelley Madore, John Benson, Jeremy Kalin, and others over the top could bring a DFL legislature to bear on the real issues facing Minnesota today.
Comments:
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Wm said:
Do you know if these numbers are correlated with the late-cycle money Entenza donated?
Was that to a 527, or to the MN DFL as a party?
Wm said:Do you know if these numbers are correlated with the late-cycle money Entenza donated?
Was that to a 527, or to the MN DFL as a party?
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MN Campaign Report said:
Not sure about Entenza's donations. I'm fairly sure the cap on individual donations to in-state candidates is around $90,000...if he did donate to a bunch of candidates, it would be spread pretty thin pretty quickly considering some of their fundraising totals. But again, I'm not sure.
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MN Campaign Report said:Not sure about Entenza's donations. I'm fairly sure the cap on individual donations to in-state candidates is around $90,000...if he did donate to a bunch of candidates, it would be spread pretty thin pretty quickly considering some of their fundraising totals. But again, I'm not sure.
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