When a campaign starts warning that “The only poll that counts is the one on election day,” political writers know that means the numbers are bad and getting worse.
So when a spokesman for Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner said Thursday that the Republican primary for governor “is not going to be a fund-raising battle,’’ it’s a pretty good bet that the money race is not going well.
For Poizner, that’s an understatement. Since June 30, Poizner has reported receiving just two – as in one, two – contributions of more than $5,000, the amount that has to be immediately reported to California’s secretary of state.
The $50,000 he received is not only orders of magnitude less than the $2.5 million former eBay CEO Meg Whitman took in, but it’s also half as much as former Rep. Tom Campbell, typically the fiscal caboose in the governor’s race, collected over the same period.
Not a problem, said Jarrod Agen, a campaign spokesman for Poizner, said in an interview.
While Poizner’s people have been fund-raising, “we’ve obviously been working on policy” in recent months, he said.
Besides, this campaign “is not going to be a fund-raising battle, but a battle for support and we’re going to win that battle,’’ Agen added.
Well, sure, but it takes money to help gather that support and the $2.5 million that’s flowed to Whitman in the past three months will go a long way toward building that backing. And that figure doesn’t even count the $15 million of her own money the Atherton resident dropped into the campaign in July.
And if you’re talking support, Whitman has more than 200 contributors since June 30, compared to 13 for Campbell and that two for Poizner.
Those numbers don’t really tell the story of the campaign, Agen argued.
For the past couple of years, Poizner has been making the rounds of GOP organizations across the state, helping them raise money and meeting the local Republican activists who will provide the ground troops needed in any campaign.
“Our strategy has been to get grassroots support and that’s what we’re doing,” Agen said. Since only contributions of $5,000 or more are reported immediately, money from smaller donors is often overlooked, since it won’t show up until the end of the year campaign statement is reported on Feb. 1.
A healthy chunk of Whitman’s money comes from out-of-state donors, who won’t be voting next June. Of the 25 contributors who gave her $5,000 or more this month, 13 were from outside California, who combined to donate $137,000 to her campaign.
That’s no surprise, said Agen.
“Meg Whitman is a fund-raiser. That’s what she’s done for years. That’s her job,” he said.
You also can argue that the dollar gap doesn’t mean as much for Poizner, since he’s got plenty of his own cash to make up the difference. He gave $14 million to his 2004 campaign for insurance commissioner and already has put $4.2 million into his run for governor, with more expected.
But in politics, perception is every bit as important as reality. While Poizner can argue that his grassroots support will trump Whitman’s fund-raising success next June, what GOP voters see right now is that one candidate is raking in the cash and working hard to make a primary victory look inevitable.
All three of the GOP gubernatorial hopefuls will be at the state Republican convention in Indian Wells this weekend, as party activists try to decide who has the best chance to become California’s next governor.
The promise of grassroots support means plenty to those GOP activists. But money talks in politics, especially in a top-of-the-ballot campaign, which means Poizner had better be prepared to explain why his two contributions in three months isn’t a dangerous sign of financial problems to come.
John Wildermuth is a longtime writer on California politics.