The main super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton is struggling in its early efforts to line up cash toward a fundraising goal of as much as $500 million, according to sources with knowledge of its fundraising.

The group, Priorities USA Action, is trying to secure 30 or more pledges of at least $1 million apiece to be unveiled publicly when the former secretary of state officially enters the race, sources say. But, so far, it has received only about 10 firm commitments, and it is encountering resistance from top donors who have given to other Clinton-linked vehicles, including ostensibly aligned super PACs and even the apolitical Clinton Foundation.


Discussions have focused on trying to supercharge the sluggish fundraising by enlisting help from heavyweight surrogates with close ties to the Clintons, including possibly Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe or investment banker Tom Nides, who served under Hillary Clinton at the State Department, according to sources.

Priorities, which has worked to reinvent itself after helping President Barack Obama win reelection in 2012, has been buffeted by disagreements over its mission, as well as its fundraising strategy and goals, according to interviews with about a dozen Democratic donors and operatives working to lay the groundwork for an expected Clinton campaign.

Priorities occasionally has clashed behind the scenes with other groups working toward the same goal. The tensions spilled out into public view Monday, when Clinton ally David Brock quit the Priorities board amid accusations it was trying to boost its own fundraising by undercutting that of two pro-Clinton groups he runs.

While Brock said late Monday he was “open to returning” after Priorities pledged to address his concerns, it’s Priorities itself that some Clintonites are concerned about.

“People are starting to worry that Priorities could be a weak link,” said a strategist who has worked with the various pro-Clinton outside groups.

The stumbles — and the slow fundraising start — raise doubts about a key assumption about Clinton’s strength as a presidential candidate: that her allies will be able to rely on a seemingly bottomless well of support from rich supporters to build an historic political money juggernaut that will overwhelm prospective rivals.

Over the past two years, the two super PACs that have been most active paving the way for an expected Clinton campaign — Brock’s American Bridge 21st Century and Ready for Hillary — raised a combined $29 million, according to Federal Election Commission filings.

And the Clinton Foundation this week said it had raised all but $2 million of an aggressive $250 million fundraising drive for an endowment it had hoped to complete before any campaign kickoff, at which point the Clintons themselves likely would have to withdraw from foundation activities.

Meanwhile, Priorities, which was created in 2011 to help boost Obama’s reelection, has been mostly idling since it spent $75 million during the 2012 campaign. It raised only $364,000 in the past two years, and finished 2014 with less than $500,000 in the bank, according to FEC filings.

Peter Kauffmann, a spokesman for Priorities, said “we are confident that we will have the resources necessary to execute our mission.”

But there’s also debate about how much exactly the PAC will need to provide effective advertising cover for Clinton’s would-be campaign during an election cycle in which the network overseen by the conservative billionaire Koch brothers intends to spend at least $889 million.

Some Clinton allies argue that Priorities must raise as much as $500 million — a major increase from the $300 million goal floated by insiders late last year — while others privately worry that figure is out of reach, even for the Clintons. For perspective, the super PAC supporting Republican Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign raised $154 million, while the Karl Rove-conceived Crossroads advertising groups spent $325 million during that cycle.

Priorities is hampered by the absence of a Clinton campaign organization, say people familiar with its early efforts. They expect fundraising to spike once Clinton declares her candidacy, but that might not come until July, which is one reason Priorities began seeking pledged donations. The group’s co-Chair Jennifer Granholm, Executive Director Buffy Wicks and Finance Director Diana Rogalle are among those soliciting pledges for Priorities.

Many donors have begged off solicitations until Clinton formally announces, with some saying they have recently given to other groups associated with the Clintons.

Granholm and Wicks last year discussed Priorities’ efforts with Michael Vachon, a representative for billionaire financier George Soros, who has donated $25,000 to Ready for Hillary. But Vachon told them Soros had not yet made any decisions about 2016 political spending, sources say.

Another major donor got a visit from two Priorities fundraisers about a month after attending a fundraising luncheon for the Clinton Foundation but did not make a pledge to the group.

Los Angeles television producer Marcy Carsey and Boston philanthropist Barbara Lee this year turned down requests from Granholm to pledge seven figures to Priorities, according to sources, despite both having written recent large checks to other Clinton-related endeavors. Carsey had given a significant sum to the Clinton Foundation, as well as $275,000 in the last two years to EMILY’s List and Ready for Hillary, while Lee has given at least $875,000 in that span to Ready for Hillary, EMILY’s List and Brock’s American Bridge.

Carsey could not be reached for comment, while a spokeswoman for Lee said in an email, “Barbara receives a number of various requests, and as a matter of strategy, she does not publicly discuss them.”

Investment banker Robert Wolf, a top bundler for Obama who describes himself as “ fully supportive” of a Clinton 2016 campaign, nonetheless said he hasn’t pledged to Priorities.

“In 2014, I gave to CGI [the Clinton Global Initiative], Clinton Foundation, Obama Library and DNC [the Democratic National Committee] and individual races, so I have not focused yet on 2016 Presidential stuff, but will at some point,” he wrote in an email.

There is a sense among some donors that donations to various Clinton-linked efforts are indistinguishable, say sources who travel in Democratic finance circles. That impression may be reinforced by the involvement of a handful of key operatives in both the political and foundation fundraising efforts.

Brock and his fundraising team, including his star fundraiser, Mary Pat Bonner, who also raises money for Ready for Hillary, have raised funds for the foundation on a pro bono basis. The foundation official who oversaw the endowment drive, Dennis Cheng, served as a finance director on Clinton’s 2008 campaign and is expected to play a similar role in any 2016 bid.

Cheng is stepping down at the end of this week, which some read as a signal that Hillaryland is officially shifting its attention to a more imminent campaign.

Clinton Foundation spokesman Craig Minassian credited Cheng with “diversifying the donor base” of the foundation, which works on public health and women’s empowerment initiatives around the world.

Priorities board member Joe Solmonese, a former president of the Human Rights Campaign, said major donors aren’t going to conflate any of the pro-Clinton super PACs, let alone the foundation.

“People who write big checks like that are a lot smarter than that,” he said. “Having many different entities doing many different things is necessary to win in the context of an election cycle. And donors are sophisticated enough to evaluate these things individually and to give on the basis of what they’re passionate about and what there is a need for.”

A veteran Democratic operative with close ties to the Clintons who has been briefed on Priorities efforts said, “I have not heard of anyone saying, ‘I gave at the office.’ The folks Priorities is talking to are intensely political people. Many were there for Clinton the first time, they were there for Obama, they’ll be there for Hillary this time, and they’ll be there for Chelsea if she ever runs.”

The operative said it had not been determined whether Priorities would release the list of pledged donations, casting the pledge push as just in the “internal discussion” phase. “I’m less interested in the announcement as I am in the cash.” And the operative also stressed that the overall fundraising goal had not been definitively determined, while conceding that waiting for Clinton to declare her intentions creates planning and fundraising challenges.

“Nobody is going to write a seven-figure check for a cause that has not yet come to fruition,” said the operative.

The resulting questions about how Priorities would make best use the interregnum between the Obama and Clinton campaigns has occasionally left the impression that “there is a lot of lurching over there,” in the words of one Democrat involved in laying the groundwork for a Clinton campaign.

And there have been lingering tensions from the 2008 Democratic presidential primary between some Clinton backers and Priorities co-Chair Jim Messina, who ran Obama’s reelection campaign and is said to have taken a significant behind-the-scenes role in shaping Priorities’ strategy.

Then came this week’s blow-up, during which Brock, whose groups defend Clinton against attacks, suggested that the Priorities leadership was pursuing “their own personal agendas.”

Granholm dismissed concerns about the infighting, asserting in a Monday night statement, “we all have the same shared goals.”

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