The surprising defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) shocked the GOP and delighted many Democrats, but it also sent the House Republican caucus into a frenzy over who would fill Cantor’s shoes as the party’s No. 2 man. Palace intrigue — already gathering steam due to speculation that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) would step down at year’s end and Cantor would take his job — intensified, but the nature of Cantor’s defeat also raised questions about what congressional Republicans want in their leaders.

Conventional wisdom (for whatever that’s worth these days) has held that lawmakers prefer colleagues who like them. That’s not a social media “like”; that’s a “show me the money” like. The amount of money a leadership hopeful spreads around to others — through donations to their campaigns and through support of national party organizations — can be a predictor of a successful progression up the ladder.

Leading the pack of hopefuls to replace Cantor is the man already in the No. 3 position, House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). McCarthy, whose job requires enforcing party discipline, has been endorsed by Cantor and is already claiming victory before the caucus vote, which is scheduled for next week. McCarthy has a record of dispersing money to a widening field of Republican candidates, just as Cantor did. In terms of money distributed, he is the heir apparent.

McCarthy reached the higher echelons of the House in 2009, when he was appointed chief deputy whip, the No. 4 Republican slot in the House — but by then, he’d already started building a base of followers. Since 2006, through his Majority Committee PAC, McCarthy has spent close to $2.5 million to support more than 300 GOP House candidates.

He has been loyal to a swath of freshmen who emerged from the 2010 midterm elections that gave Republicans control of the House. His top five recipients, Reps. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.), Jeff Denham (R-Calif.), Kevin Yoder (R-Kans.), Reid Ribble (R-Wis.) and Steve Southerland (R-Fla.), have all received more than $20,000 from McCarthy’s leadership PAC since their first election to the House that year

While Cantor has given, by far, more money to other candidates than anyone else, his overall contributions are overshadowed by those of Boehner, who transfers an enormous amount of money directly to party organizations. McCarthy seems to be trying to do both. Besides his donations to other candidates, his campaign has transferred $480,000 to the National Republican Congressional Committee, the main piece of GOP party machinery used to aid Republican House candidates, in the 2014 election cycle alone. He’s given another $110,000 to the Republican Party of California.

Like Cantor, McCarthy’s fundraising effort is primarily bankrolled by blue chip industries. His campaign committee and leadership PAC have received generous funding from the finance, real estate, pharmaceutical and oil and gas industries, with some of his top donors including Blue Cross/ Blue Shield, Chevron Corp and Goldman Sachs.

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Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) is the Lone Star state’s best hope for getting a member of its delegation into a top leadership position. But if generosity to others is a measure of electability, Sessions is running behind McCarthy, especially this cycle.

Sessions has been no piker: Over the course of his career (he was elected in 1996), he’s given more than $4.6 million away — from both his campaign committee and leadership PAC — and at least $2.9 million of that went directly to other candidates. Those are strong numbers, and similar to McCarthy’s. But so far in the 2014 cycle, Sessions’ leadership PAC and campaign have given away just $451,000. Sessions has been supportive of the party, with the bulk of his contributions this cycle winding up with national GOP organizations, instead of in the pockets of other candidates. His campaign kicked $263,000 up to the National Republican Congressional Committee, making him the ninth biggest supporter of the NRCC. Unfortunately for him, as noted earlier, McCarthy has given $480,000. Several names who aren’t even in contention for Cantor’s job are ahead of him on that list as well: Rep. Dave Camp (Mich.), as well as Rep. Pete Roskam (Ill.), who is being bandied about for the No. 3 and No. 4 House GOP leadership spots if McCarthy moves up.

Loyalty to the party might not be the thing that wins anyone Cantor’s old job, especially if the charge is that Cantor was too plugged into the national GOP establishment network. Sessions, however, has not been so active this cycle in courting the rank and file, either. His campaign and leadership PAC have given just $128,000 to other candidates, and the list of his top recipients so far this cycle are anything but an all-star list. Rep. David Jolly (R-Fla.), who was elected in a March special election and is the House member with the least seniority, is the top recipient of Sessions cash this session. Over the course of his career, Sessions has given the most to Rep. Dave Reichert (R-Wash.), $38,000.

McCarthy outshines Sessions as a fundraiser, as well, bringing in $3.5 million for his 2014 campaign to Sessions’ $1.7 million. Sessions’ leadership PAC, PETE PAC, has raised just $428,000, or roughly $1 million less than McCarthy’s Majority PAC.

Health professionals have been Sessions’ biggest supporter, both over the course of his career and in this cycle, followed by the oil and gas industry, unsurprising given his district in suburban Dallas. But, like Cantor, McCarthy and virtually all of the top House Republicans, Sessions gets a fair share of his funds from the financial world. His No. 1 donor this cycle (excluding Votesane PAC, which passes along earmarked donations from grassroots donors) is payday lender Cash America International. Pricewaterhouse Coopers, Capital One Financial, Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase all make the list of top 20 donors to his campaign and leadership PAC. Koch Industries, owned by David and Charles Koch, the billionaire industrialists who are historically wary of the GOP establishment, is the second largest donor to Sessions’ committees this cycle.

But it’s not clear that Sessions would be any more of an outsider than Cantor was or McCarthy might be. His power base stems from his control of the House Rules Committee, the ultimate insider position, which governs the arcana of daily legislative life in Congress and stands as the gatekeeper to any floor vote or debate for almost all legislation.



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