There’s setting a record. There’s breaking a record. There’s smashing a record. And then there’s just plain smithereening a record. And there’s no doubt that’s what Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has just done to the record for first-quarter fundraising for a Presidential election.
The old record used to be Al Gore‘s $8.7 million in 1999.
Two Democratic presidential candidates broke previous fundraising records during the first three months of the year, with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton setting a high bar of $26 million in new contributions for the quarter.
Former Sen. John Edwards‘ campaign said he had raised more than $14 million since the beginning of the year.
The Clinton campaign also announced that she had transferred about $10 million from her last Senate campaign, bringing her total receipts for the quarter to $36 million. Edwards had no such transfers of money.
[...]
Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois — sandwiched in public opinion polls between Clinton and Edwards — had yet to reveal his totals.
Wouldn’t surprise too many people if he were sandwiched between them in terms of fundraising too. So it’s entirely possible that the top three Democratic candidates will all end up handsomely smashing the previous record.
It’ll be interesting to see how the Republican candidates compare to the Democrats, and to the Republican record of $8.7 million set by Phil Gramm in 1995.
*** Update #1, 12:35 pm on April 2***
The top Republicans, as per WaPo:
Romney collected $20 million for the first quarter of this year. Guiliani raised $14 million, a number that falls well short of the $25 million goal his campaign team set out in an internal strategy document that surfaced publicly in January.
AP has Romney at $23 million, and Guiliani at “more than $15 million”.
*** Update #2, 6:15 am, April 3 ***
John “Look-Ma-I’m-a-whore” McCain raised only $12.5 million.
McCain’s $12.5 million appeared to be another sign the Arizona senator’s campaign is flagging.
“He’s now coming to this race a day late and $12 million short,” said David King, a professor at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Not to mention a few screws short, as well.