Republican front-runner Rudolph W. Giuliani is spending heavily in his pursuit of more money for his presidential campaign, while rival Mitt Romney is using his riches to win over voters in states where there will be early voting, campaign finance reports filed Friday show.
The candidates' tactics appear to be serving their ends. Giuliani was the one major Republican candidate who raised more money from donors in the second quarter of 2007 than he did in the first 90 days. And Romney is inching up in polls in Iowa and New Hampshire -- but at a cost. He spent $20.47 million in the second quarter of 2007 -- nearly all of the $21 million he raised in donations from others and loans to himself.
Romney's second-quarter spending was nearly twice the $11 million Giuliani spent. Altogether, Romney has burned through $31.8 million in the first half of the year, to Giuliani's $17 million, the midyear reports show.
"It is an absolute spectacle," said Craig Holman, a lobbyist for Public Citizen, a Washington group pushing for limits on campaign fundraising. "It is very sad that these candidates are running around the country trying to raise as much money as they can. We're all measuring them" by what they raise, Holman said.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), once the presumed GOP front-runner, is beset by fundraising difficulties and is not expected to file his second-quarter report until later in the weekend; the reports must be filed by Sunday. Democratic candidates also are not expected to file until Sunday.
As of the June 30 close of the second quarter, Giuliani had $18.3 million in the bank, after raising $33.54 million in the first half of 2007. Romney had $12.1 million. He raised more than $35 million from other people in the first six months of the year. By far the wealthiest candidate to enter the race, Romney has bolstered his bottom line by lending his campaign nearly $9 million, pushing his six-month total to $44.4 million.
In national polls, Giuliani consistently has been atop the Republican pack. Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, has lagged at about 10%. But after paying to air television ads in Iowa and New Hampshire, Romney is rising in surveys focused on those two states, where voting will take place in six months.
Indeed, Romney is significantly outspending Giuliani in all four early-voting states -- Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada -- $2.33 million to less than $262,000 for Giuliani, the reports filed Friday show.
