Not from Virginians, apparently. VPAP today put out a breakdown of the donations made to both Chairman Kaine and Governor Allen’s campaigns, and the numbers are interesting.
While Kaine has out raised Allen by $1.3 million, Kaine has raised over half of his money from out-of-state donors. Kaine raised $3.8 million from non-Virginians, compared with only $1.9 million raised by non-Virginians by Governor Allen. Despite the temporary funding advantage, nobody in their right mind is concerned with whether either Kaine or Allen will be outspent.
Allen’s largest fundraising segment came from Virginians, nearly $2.5 million, which is over $600k more than Kaine raised from Virginians. Kaine leads in small dollar donations, which aren’t itemized by address, so it’s hard to tell where they’re from. The difference, though is minimal, only $300k. Allen leads in PAC donations, which should level off once Kaine rounds up the inevitable labor and liberal social group cash that has yet to be spent this cycle.
So what do these numbers tell us?
Well, first, it demonstrates that it’s good to be a former party Chairman. Thanks to his fundraising efforts at the DNC, Kaine has as good a list as anybody and can get a ton of out of state money. Allen, on the other hand, has been focusing his attention on Virginia for the last six years since he left office and has been able to convince more voters here to pony up for his reelection.
Second, we can be sure that this is going to be one heck of an expensive campaign season, but for the first time in over a decade, the Democratic challenger in this Senate seat will be well financed. Allen raise $20 million when he defeated Chuck Robb in 2000 and raised $16 million in his loss to Jim Webb. Both Robb and Webb raised less than half of Allen’s haul. Kaine, however, given his connections at the DNC and with the White House to help should be able to raise as much or more than Allen this cycle. Whether it makes a difference is difficult to tell, given Virginia’s status as a battleground.
Third, the important number, at least to me, is the number raised from Virginia donors. No one who donates to a campaign is going to fail to vote. So raising more money from Virginians is an important sign of support from the voters back home. It’s hard to break down these numbers into individual contributions – VPAP doesn’t do that, unfortunately – so it’s hard to tell if Allen is simply getting more from a smaller number of donors or vice versa. Regardless, it’s good show of support, especially considering the primary season isn’t even over and the real fundraising will begin in earnest in June.
In the end though, money is money, but being able to take money from folks who can vote for you is a sign of solid support. I’m also proud to report that folks in my neighborhood haven given to Allen at rate of 57% to 42% for Kaine. VPAP’s has a fun little tool that lets you see donations by zip code. You can find it here.
This is going to be a close race, but both candidates should be very well financed coming into November.
