Fred Thompson today reported that he raised $3.4 million last month for his presidential exploratory committee, causing some supporters to start handwringing because that amount fell short of the $5 million he was expected to raise.
But still, Thompson did considerably better than Rudy Giuliani during his exploratory days.
In two fundraisers in June, Thompson collected nearly three times as much as the $1.3 million Giuliani raised the first six weeks of his exploratory committee (most of it at one pre-Christmas fundraiser). Thompson also had many more donors -- 9,167 in all 50 states -- than Giuliani, who had just 739 contributors, nearly all of them friends and business associates in New York and Texas.
Thompson poses a particular problem for Giuliani, since the tall man with the Southern drawl is pushing Giuliani in the polls as conservatives look to him to represent the right in the fight for the White House next year.
Thompson's total, reported by his non-profit political "testing the waters" committee to the IRS, is dwarfed by former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney's prodigious fundraising feat of collecting $6.5 million in a day (Jan. 8, 2007). But as a possible harbinger of things to come, it's twice the $1.7 million reported in January by then GOP frontrunner Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).
Tom Brune