As The Washington Post reports, efforts by a crowded field of potential Republican presidential candidates to win over wealthy donors have set off a series of contests for their support that could stall the GOP race for months.
Despite the appeals for money, which have stepped up in recent weeks, many top donors have committed to being noncommittal, wary of fueling the kind of costly and politically damaging battle that dominated the 2012 primaries. Senior party fundraisers believe most campaigns will not be able to set up their fundraising operations in full until at least the spring.
In Florida, allies of former governor Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio are tussling over many of the same donors. In Texas, bundlers are feeling pulled by Bush, Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Ted Cruz. Perry and Cruz are also competing for the backing of wealthy evangelical Christians, as are Gov. Bobby Jindal, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee.
The prospective 2016 candidates face more intense pressure than ever to raise substantial sums of money, with GOP strategists predicting that the eventual winner will need at least $75 million to get through the first three primaries—and $1 billion by Election Day. In a field of as many as 23 Republican candidates, raising that kind of money will not be easy. Read the full story.
The field of potential candidates at this point is about twice as long as it has ever been in prior elections, The Washington Post reports. Among them, Post reporters Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blakethe recently listed Jindal as the seventh most likely to gain the GOP nomination. The two had placed Jindal at No. 9 in their previous weekly look at the potential candidates. Noting that Jindal reportedly has enlisted former Missouri senator Jim Talent and former ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton to advise him on foreign policy, the two reporters say “that’s the move of someone who is preparing to run for president. But with Jindal, that was never really in doubt—especially since he is termed out as governor in early 2016. This guy has oodles of potential, but he needs polish and some more personality.”
