Thread: Cannon has fundraising advantage over Jacob

Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Cannon has fundraising advantage over Jacob

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ALAN CHOATE - Daily Herald
U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, has a more than 2-to-1 fundraising advantage over challenger John Jacob in the race for the Republican nomination in Utah's Third Congressional District.

Cannon has also spent twice as much -- and while that's a function of available money, a spokeswoman for the Jacob campaign also said that suggests the race is tighter than the incumbent would like.

GOP primary voters will decide June 27 whether the nomination belongs to Cannon or Jacob, an Eagle Mountain businessman. The winner will appear on November's general election ballot.

Reports filed through Monday show that Cannon had raised $815,687 from donors, PACs and loans. Jacob's total was $383,860, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.

Cannon has also secured a high-profile endorsement from the National Rifle Association, and a group of Utah political leaders including state Senate President John Valentine, R-Orem, is scheduled to announce their endorsement of him today. First Lady Laura Bush has recorded radio ads supporting his campaign.

All that really tells us is the obvious -- Cannon enjoys the advantages of incumbency and Jacob must foot most of the bill for his own campaign, said Kelly Patterson, a political science professor at Brigham Young University.

"Incumbents are known entities in Washington, D.C., and they have access to political action committees," he said. "It's only a few types of political action committees that take chances on challengers."

The same often holds true for individual donors. And Cannon, running for his sixth term in Congress, has donor lists and contacts to tap.

"People don't like to give to challengers, because challengers lose," Patterson said. "People like to back winners, or individuals who have a higher probability of winning. In our system, that's the incumbent."

Still, he said it's hard to predict an electoral outcome based on fund raising. About 56 percent of Cannon's funding came from political action committees. Another 27 percent was donated by individual contributors.

His PAC donors span a wide spectrum and include well-known entities like the National Restaurant Association, AT&T, Wal-Mart, Yahoo! and Pfizer, as well as lesser-known donors such as national associations for postmasters and rural letter carriers and a financial consulting consortium called Deloitte & Touche.

Cannon also recorded loans from himself to his campaign totaling almost $138,000.

Almost 92 percent of Jacob's funding came from loans to himself -- $353,000 worth, according to the financial reports. He also reported $27,860 from individual contributions and $3,000 from two PACs, the Utah Bankers Association and Zions Bank.

Reports show that Jacob spent $346,000 through the beginning of June, compared to Cannon's $612,000 outlay.

Cannon's campaign did not return a phone call seeking comment Tuesday. Jacob campaign spokeswoman Hayden Hill saw a silver lining in the campaign finance disparity.

"We're excited by it," she said. "If you look at what Cannon spent at this time in 2004, it was almost half. Obviously he's viewing us as more of a challenge.

"We see that as him recognizing that he's vulnerable."

Cannon's pre-primary report in 2004 showed that his campaign had spent $324,400 at that point.

Hill said Jacob hasn't done much broadcast advertising, which can be expensive, but they also haven't ruled out increasing radio and television exposure. Jacob is also prepared to pump another $200,000 of his own money into the race, Hill said.

U.S. Congress, District 3

CONTRIBUTIONS

Cannon: $815,687.26

Jacob: $383,860

SOURCES

Cannon

Individual contributors: $219,109.9

Political action committees: $458,614.86

Loans to himself: $137,962.50

Jacob

Individual contributors: $27,860

Political action committees: $3,000

Loans to himself: $353,000

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A1.

http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/183127/3/

Cannon has also spent twice as much -- and while that's a function of available money, a spokeswoman for the Jacob campaign also said that suggests the race is tighter than the incumbent would like.

Yeppers, and may it get even tighter