Most of Romney’s Congressional Endorsers Received Cash From His PAC

Mitt Romney.Christopher Gannon/Mct/ZUMA Press

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


As the 2012 GOP contenders head into primary-season crunch time, 51 sitting members of Congress so far have already endorsed on-and-off front-runner Mitt Romney. And nearly 90 percent of those endorsements came from lawmakers who have received campaign cash from Romney.

Since the 2004 elections, Romney’s leadership PACs have donated a grand total of $163,620 to the campaigns of these 45 endorsers, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Top recipients include Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO), who received $9,670 from Romney during Blunt’s 2010 campaign, and Rep. Charlie Bass (R-NH), who’s nabbed a combined $10,000. Blunt—known as Romney’s key Capitol Hill liaison—beat out tea party darling Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) on Tuesday to become vice chairman of the Republican Conference, the fifth-most senior position in the GOP caucus. Bass got some extra national attention in late November when a leaked Romney campaign memo warned that the congressman’s endorsement came with baggage associated with his “lack of purity” on revenue increases. “[C]onservatives don’t trust Charlie and are guessing this means he’ll vote to raise taxes,” the memo noted.

Oddly enough, Romney reserved the most campaign dough for a tea party power broker who hasn’t announced his endorsement, yet: Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), who collected an even $12,000 over several years. Earlier this fall, rumors circulated that DeMint was gearing up to endorse Romney. The senator has, however, withheld his endorsement for the South Carolina primary, and his office quickly shot down the rumors as pure “fabrication.”

The other 151 sitting members of Congress who have collectively received $524,940 in campaign contributions from Romney have yet to formally endorse a candidate. Still, Romney has a significantly higher batting average than that of his chief rival. Since the 1990s, Newt Gingrich’s PACs and committee have given a total of $260,560 to 42 current members of Congress, and not one of those lawmakers has endorsed the former House Speaker in the 2012 race. But with the way the Gingrich surge has been going lately, things might be starting to change already.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate