We Did it: What we learned from the monthly FEC filings — The cavalry comes for Hickenlooper

Jun 22, 2020

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Quick Fix

— Joe Biden outraised President Donald Trump in May, but the president still maintains a large cash on hand advantage. Plus, what the party committees raised.

— After a rough couple of weeks for former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, the cavalry is coming in as he tries to hold off Andrew Romanoff in next week's Democratic Senate primary.

— Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) launched a negative ad against her primary opponent, while millions in outside money flooded into the race between Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) and his primary opponent, Jamaal Bowman.

Happy Monday! Email me at zmontellaro@politico.com, or follow me on Twitter at @ZachMontellaro.

Email the rest of the Campaign Pro team at sshepard@politico.com, jarkin@politico.com and amutnick@politico.com. Follow them on Twitter: @POLITICO_Steve, @JamesArkin and @allymutnick.

Days until the Kentucky, New York and Virginia primaries and Mississippi, North Carolina and South Carolina primary runoffs: 1

Days until the Democratic convention: 56

Days until the Republican convention: 64

Days until the 2020 election: 134

TopLine

THE CASH DASH — Another monthly filing deadline has come and gone, giving us a look into the finances of the presidential campaigns, major super PACs and party committees. For the first time, Biden and the DNC said they outraised Trump's operation, bringing in $80.8 in million in May to Trump and the RNC's $74 million, Elena Schneider and I wrote.

But the Trump campaign still maintains a large cash-on-hand advantage. The Trump operation said it had $265 million in cash on hand, while filings for the Biden campaign and the DNC revealed Democrats had roughly $122 million on hand at the end of May. (Recall that both Biden and Trump joint fundraising committees don't file monthly. The Trump campaign includes JFC money in its cash on hand; a DNC spokesperson declined to provide details about their JFCs' cash balances.) Read Elena's and my story for more details on presidential super PAC filings. (Here's the Trump campaign filing, RNC filing, Biden campaign filing and DNC filing.) A JFC between the DNC and state parties that does not include the Biden campaign, the Democratic Grassroots Victory Fund, has $7 million in the bank as well (filing).

Heading downballot, it was another close round of fundraising for both parties' campaign committees that ultimately saw Democrats edge out their Republican counterparts.

— The DSCC raised $11.2 million. They spent $7.7 million and had $32.4 million in cash on hand (filing). The NRSC raised $10.1 million. They spent $7.9 million and have $40 million in the bank (filing).

— The DCCC raised $10.9 million, spent $7.1 million and has $86.3 million in the bank (filing). The NRCC raised $10.6 million, spent $7.7 million and has $55.2 million in cash on hand (filing).

For the congressional-focused super PACs, most are focused on expanding their war chests.

— Senate Leadership Fund, the Republican super PAC focused on the Senate, raised $8 million, spent $223,000 and has $68 million in the bank (filing ). Seven-figure donors include $2 million from Bernard Marcus, $1.5 million collectively from brothers M. Jude and J. Christopher Reyes and $1 million from Warren Stephens.

— Senate Majority PAC, the Democratic Senate super PAC, raised $11.4 million, spent $8.6 million and has $64.7 million in the bank (filing). Seven-figure donors include $1 million from the IBEW PAC Educational Fund and $1 million from Kathryn Murdoch.

— House Majority PAC, the Democratic super PAC, raised $2.3 million and spent $941,000, with $49.6 million in the bank (filing). HMP had no seven-figure donors last month (but kudos to its treasurer, who filed on Thursday.) Congressional Leadership Fund, its Republican counterpart, is a quarterly filer.

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Presidential Big Board

COALITION BUILDING — A key part of Trump's base is his unbreaking support among white evangelical voters. Now, some Republicans are fretting that it could at least be bending. "Many conservative evangelical leaders have argued that Biden's positions on cultural issues — like abortion, judges and religious freedom — are disqualifying," POLITICO's Gabby Orr reported. "Still, anxiety is growing inside Trump's orbit about the former vice president's ability to peel off Christian voters who supported Trump in 2016, including the 81 percent of white evangelicals he carried." Particularly vexing? The recent Supreme Court decision upholding workplace discrimination protections for LGBTQ Americans, which was written by Trump appointee Justice Neal Gorsuch.

President Donald Trump arrives on stage to speak at a campaign rally at the BOK Center, Saturday, June 20, 2020, in Tulsa, Okla. | AP Photo

WHAT'S IN A RALLY? — Trump's Saturday rally in Tulsa, Okla. underperformed expectations, with plenty of empty seats inside the stadium, POLITICO's Eugene Daniels wrote from Tulsa. I'm not going to relitigate why it was empty — the Trump says it was protesters and the media's fault, Biden's team said it was a lack of enthusiasm, and The New York Times said it was TikTok and K-pop, which I find a little dubious — but one thing that'll likely stick with us for a while is what Trump said on testing. "When you do testing to that extent, you're going to find more people, you're going to find more cases," the president said at the rally . "So I said to my people, slow the testing down, please." His team insisted Trump was joking, but it was immediately clipped into an ad from American Bridge.

ON THE AIRWAVES — The Trump campaign is up with a pair of new national ads. The first ad, "Just Getting Started," says Biden's "failed, old liberal ideas would crush our economy just as it's recovering," before saying Trump is strong on the economy. The second ad called "Fortitude" says "Biden is clearly diminished" and attacks him for his age.

— America First Action, the Pro-Trump super PAC, also launched another round of anti-Biden ads in Michigan on NAFTA, Pennsylvania on fracking and Wisconsin on NAFTA.

SIGN OF THE TIMES — Some field work has tentatively begun again. POLITICO's Chris Cadelago reports that Republicans have paid door-knockers deployed again in nearly every November battleground, while Democrats are weighing if or how they can return.

THE OTHER GUYS — Could there be a Jill Stein redux? POLITICO's Alex Thompson and Holly Otterbein talked with Howie Hawkins, the presumptive Green Party nominee, and looked at how he might fit into the race.

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Down the Ballot

COLORADO BLUES — After a rough week or so, the cavalry is coming for Hickenlooper ahead of his June 30 primary against Romanoff for the right to face Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) in November. Campaign Pro's James Arkin has a deep dive on how Hickenlooper is trying to recover from recent stumbles, including being fined by the state's ethics commission and apologizing for insensitive comments on race.

Romanoff, his primary challenger, also went negative on Hickenlooper, citing in an ad those very stumbles while using footage from the (infamous?) Hickenlooper shower ad from 2010. This was met by tut-tutting from many Colorado Democrats. Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) said in a statement that Romanoff was deploying "cynical, false attacks that play into Republicans' hands," citing his past clashes that have not endeared Romanoff to many Colorado Democrats. Hickenlooper also picked up several endorsements from his would-be future colleagues should he win the nomination and then again in November, getting the backing of Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.).

And he's also getting some backup on the airwaves. SMP rolled out a new ad tying Gardner to Trump while promoting Hickenlooper. Hickenlooper "will beat Cory Gardner and stand up for Colorado," the ad's narrator says. A pair of FEC filings last week from SMP said they were spending about $1.5 million on pro-Hickenlooper advertising. A pop-up super PAC called "Let's Turn Colorado Blue" also dropped over $1 million on an ad opposing Romanoff, saying he "stood with a Republican governor, passing the nation's harshest anti-immigrant laws." Hickenlooper also rolled out a pair of ads that are positive spots focusing on his record as governor.

PRIMARY PROBLEMS — Interestingly, Ocasio-Cortez has launched a negative TV ad against her primary opponent in NY-14. The ad says Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, a former CNBC anchor running with the support of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, "isn't one of us" because she was "a Republican living in Trump Tower" in 2016. The freshman Democrat, one of Congress' best fundraisers, certainly has money to spend. But Caruso-Cabrera, who had raised north of $2 million, also gave her campaign $1 million in the final stretch of the race. At a minimum, worth keeping an eye on tomorrow.

— The Democratic primary between Engel and Bowman in NY-16 has very quickly attracted a lot of outside money. As of Sunday afternoon, about $3.5 million in outside spending has been reported to the FEC, almost every dime of it since the beginning of the month. The biggest spender has been DMFI PAC, which has spent about $1.5 million boosting Engel and hitting Bowman. (A recent TV ad from the group criticized Bowman over back taxes, which Bowman says he's paid back). Another spender popping up in the district: The dark money groups Avacy Initiatives Inc. and Perise Practical Inc., which I reported previously intervened in the NM-03 Democratic primary.

But the Justice Democrats PAC has spent $920,000 on its efforts backing Bowman, and the Working Families Party's IE arm has spent $409,000. The WFP IE recently launched a new ad with New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams promoting Bowman. (The Washington Post's Dave Weigel had a good story from the district over the weekend, too.)

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FIRST IN SCORE — KEEPING SCORE — The U.S. The Chamber of Commerce is out with its scorecard grading members of Congress , and has awarded 259 members of Congress — 210 House members and 49 senators — with its "Spirit of Enterprise Award," which honors "their support for pro-growth policies" and bipartisanship. "In these uncertain times with daunting economic and social challenges facing our nation, it is imperative that leaders in Washington are focused on propelling American businesses forward to create jobs and economic growth from California to Maine," Tom Donohue, the Chamber's CEO, said in a statement.

PICKING CANDIDATES — Republican Aliscia Andrews won the Republican nomination to face freshman Democratic Rep. Jennifer Wexton in VA-10 in a convention over the weekend. Wexton flipped the seat out from underneath then-GOP Rep. Barbara Comstock in 2018, but this is likely a seat skittering away from being truly competitive. Wexton won by about 12 points in the midterms, and Hillary Clinton won the district by roughly 10 points in 2016.

RUNNING THROUGH THE FINISH LINE — The conservative Protect Freedom PAC released a new TV ad criticizing Lynda Bennett, who is running in Tuesday's NC-11 GOP primary runoff, as a Never Trumper and promotes Madison Cawthorn as the right pick. The ad has audio of Bennett saying she opposed Trump, which will sound familiar to those who remember my colleague Ally Mutnick's story in February on the race. At the time, Bennett said the audio was selectively edited and she was merely role-playing as a Trump opponent. It is unclear how effective the ad will be: Trump endorsed Bennett in early June.

ON THE AIRWAVES — Sen. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.) is out with two new ads. In one ad , she says she'll "always protect those with pre-existing conditions," and saying Democrat Mark Kelly's "attacks on me are false and they're shameful." The second ad has McSally attacking Biden on China. The NRSC also launched another ad against Kelly, attacking him over China.

Kelly is also out with a new ad , highlighting his military background. The narrator also calls McSally's attacks on him "a new low" and also "shameful."

— Iowa Democratic Senate nominee Theresa Greenfield is out with a new ad saying she doesn't take corporate PAC money.

— Issue One Action, an arm of the good governance group, is out with a new TV ad promoting mail-in voting. The ad features former Rep. Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.) promoting mail voting. "Many Republican governors are expanding absentee voting options, and they need Congress' help," he says in the ad. The ad will run nationally on Fox News this week and is part of a $750,000 campaign.

FIRST IN SCORE — ENDORSEMENT CORNER — The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is endorsing Republican Bill Hagerty in his bid for the open Tennessee Senate seat. "He has a proven track record of leading responsibly and standing up for good policies," Donohue said in a statement. The open Tennessee seat is likely to remain in GOP hands, but Hagerty has to navigate a contested primary against self-funding surgeon Manny Sethi.

CODA — QUOTE OF THE DAY: "In Florida we have a history of fumbling at the two-yard line. I don't think we're going to do that this year," Florida Democratic Party executive director Juan Peñalosa to The Washington Post.

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