Bush money machine in high gear even without official campaign

Fredreka Schouten | USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — Jeb Bush hasn't declared his White House candidacy, but the former Florida governor is raising record amounts to build a political infrastructure that could overwhelm his rivals for the Republican nomination and break ground on campaign finance.

The Republican's allies have deployed three political arms — a traditional political action committee, a super PAC that can take unlimited funds and a non-profit group that can take donations of any size without disclosing donors' identities — to support his nascent campaign. Through his various political organizations, Bush has drawn an experienced cadre of political strategists, communication aides and technology experts to his campaign-in-waiting.

By waiting to declare his candidacy, Bush's allies argue, he can collect big checks for his Right to Rise super PAC without running afoul of rules that limit coordination between super PACs and federal candidates, who are barred from accepting donations larger than $2,700 for the primary election.

At a recent donors' gathering in Miami, Bush told supporters he had collected a record amount for a Republican candidate at this stage in the nominating process, but he has not released a fundraising total before required filings with federal regulators in July.

Bush, who has held scores of fundraisers around the country, probably will report "an extraordinary number no one has ever seen before," said David Beightol, a lobbyist and Bush supporter who has participated in three of his fundraising events in the Washington area, including one last week that Beightol and others in attendance said exceeded expectations.

The party's donors are drawn to Bush because of a "thirst for leadership," Beightol said. Bush, a former two-term governor and the son and brother of U.S. presidents, has a depth of experience on domestic and foreign policy issues that few of his rivals can match, he said.

"He doesn't want to have it on his résumé that he was the Republican Party's nominee," Beightol said. "He wants to be president."

Bush's fundraising prowess may have helped deter the 2012 nominee, Mitt Romney, from making a third bid for the White House. But it has not made him the front-runner in a tightly packed Republican field. A new Saint Anselm/Bloomberg Politics poll of likely GOP primary voters in New Hampshire voters puts Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker at the front with 12% each, trailed closely by Bush and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who each drew 11%.

The fat bank account will allow Bush to stockpile money and to start to assemble a campaign infrastructure and lock in GOP talent. Key aides associated with the Bush team include Scott Jennings, a Kentucky political strategist who ran a super PAC that was instrumental in Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's 2014 re-election, and Andy Barkett, a former Facebook engineer who was the Republican National Committee's first chief technology officer.

This week, one of House Speaker John Boehner's top spokesmen, Michael Steel, joined the Bush camp.

Bush campaign officials did not have immediate comment Wednesday.

"Somebody like Jeb Bush doesn't need to be worried that his poll numbers are mediocre right now," said Fergus Cullen, a former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party. (Cullen is uncommitted in the race but has hosted meet-and-greet events for Bush and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham.)

This year, Cullen said there are fewer opportunities for candidates to break from the pack than in earlier presidential contests. The 2012 election's crowded schedule of 20 GOP debates, for instance, allowed upstart candidates to garner attention, such as then-Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann's breakout debate performance in June 2011.

This time around, the RNC has streamlined the nomination process and has sanctioned up to 12 debates, with the first encounter not scheduled until August.

"He's showing patience," Cullen said of Bush, "and so are a bunch of the others. … No one is going to drop out for a lack of financial resources."

The other candidates and their allies concede no ground to Bush.

"Nobody is going to catch Jeb on the money front," said Bobbie Kilberg,a veteran Republican fundraiser who backs New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's slow-to-start bid and will hold a fundraiser for him Thursday at her home in Northern Virginia.

"But I don't think you can equate the amount of money you raise with the amount of votes you get," she said. "The proof of the pudding will be the strength of your policy positions and in your retail political skills. Chris Christie will shine in the debates and will shine in campaigning."

Bush is not alone in advancing his presidential bid through a new crop of big-money groups authorized by a pair of federal court rulings, including the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision in 2010. The ruling permitted unlimited spending by corporations and unions in candidate elections. Other candidates also are getting support from super PACs, and several have long-standing non-profit policy arms.

Bush has stood out because he's raising large sums quickly, and his allies have pulled together the affiliated organizations in a relatively short time period.

Others are trying to catch up. Allies of Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, the first major Republican to enter the 2016 presidential race, established four super PACs and raised $31 million in a single week. New York hedge-fund magnate Robert Mercer quickly emerged as a major funder of the pro-Cruz effort.

Dathan Voelter, a Texas attorney who serves as treasurer of the pro-Cruz super PACs, said more money has come in since the first-week haul, but he declined to disclose the amount.

"We have expanded the network of high net-worth donors who are contributing," he told USA TODAY on Wednesday. "We've been pleased with the response."

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton said she would make fixing the nation's "dysfunctional" campaign-finance system a key pillar of her campaign. However, in an apparent race to compete with Republicans such as Bush, she met last week with donors to Priorities USA Action, one of the super PACs supporting her campaign.

This week, a second pro-Clinton super PAC called Correct the Record announced it would coordinate closely with Clinton's campaign. Organizers of the group, whose sole mission will be defending Clinton's record, argue that because they will not fund paid advertising they will not run afoul of rules that bar super PACs from coordinating their spending with candidates.

Richard Hasen, an expert on election law at the University of California-Irvine, called Correct the Record's move an "aggressive interpretation" of coordination rules.

It's unlikely that the six-member, gridlocked Federal Election Commission would take any action if a presidential candidate stepped over the line. The commission's chairwoman, Ann Ravel, declined to comment on any candidate's practices, but she told USA TODAY this week that "recent history" on coordination issues "portends slim hope that we will be able to reach four votes to penalize any major transgressions."

Hasen said the new campaign funding practices in 2016 are likely to set the precedent for future contests.

"The Supreme Court got the ball rolling," he said, "and candidates are pushing the ball down the hill as fast as they can."