Mary Fallin’s seat draws donations for GOP
Candidates for House 5th District raise $443,000
BY CHRIS CASTEEL
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Published: October 18, 2009
WASHINGTON — Should he decide to get in the Republican race to succeed Rep. Mary Fallin in Congress, Oklahoma Corporation Commissioner Jeff Cloud would join a field that raised nearly $443,000 in the past three months.
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Incumbents step up fundraising
In a summer that will be remembered for populist uprisings at town hall meetings, Oklahoma’s incumbent members of Congress collected hundreds of thousands of dollars from special interest groups to go along with grassroots money.
Rep. Dan Boren, D-Muskogee, got $62,500 from political action committees representing the coal industry, bankers, Realtors, defense contractors, insurers and others. He got $71,705 from individuals and finished the quarter with more than $1.3 million, by far the most of any state incumbent.
Rep. Frank Lucas, R-Cheyenne, raised $112,813 in the quarter, with slightly more than half of that coming from political action committees representing farm groups, bankers, insurers, accountants and other interests. Lucas had $378,668 in the bank at the end of the quarter.
Rep. Tom Cole, R-Moore, collected $129,739 in the quarter, taking nearly $74,000 from individuals and Indian tribes and $55,400 from the defense industry, energy companies, sugar producers, insurers and other interests. Cole finished the period with $540,918 in the bank.
Rep. John Sullivan, R-Tulsa, raised $209,860. He got more than $110,000 from individuals and more than $91,000 from special interest committees, with the rest coming from other sources, including interest on his campaign account balance. Sullivan collected money from energy companies, surgeons, dentists, insurers and other interests.
Coburn, a Republican who has yet to attract a challenger for his Senate seat, raised $629,213 in the quarter and had about $1.1 million in the bank for his re-election bid. The details of Coburn’s report weren’t available late last week, but he reported about $385,000 in donations from individuals and about $210,000 from PACs.
Already, two candidates — state
Rep. Mike Thompson and former state
Rep. Kevin Calvey — have campaign accounts exceeding $300,000, and two others raised tens of thousands of dollars from July 1 through Sept. 30.
But Cloud, who said last week that he was raising money for a possible congressional bid, can tap a big pool of people who have business before the state regulatory panel, including the lawyers, oil and gas company executives and utility employees who helped finance his 2008 re-election race.
Thompson, who is chairman of a state House energy committee, has already drawn the support of many energy company executives, along with other business leaders in the
Oklahoma City area who may be hit up by Cloud as well if he jumps in.
Thompson raised $201,095 in the last quarter and had $302,705 in the bank on Sept. 30, according to a campaign finance report filed last week with the
Federal Election Commission.
"Since the beginning of our campaign, we’ve exceeded all fundraising goals,” Thompson said. "While we’re honored by our momentum, we’re going to continue spreading our conservative message of reform across the district,” he said.
Calvey raised less than Thompson in the quarter, getting $148,235, but finished with more money in the bank, $374,035.
Calvey’s in-state donations have been supplemented by money from the
Club for Growth, whose members advocate limited government and have also been of enormous financial assistance to
Sen. Tom Coburn.
"I continue to be humbled by all of the generous support I have received from Oklahomans and from grassroots conservatives across the country who want to take Washington back from the liberal special interests,” Calvey said.
Fallin, R-Oklahoma City, is giving up the congressional seat she’s held for three years to run for governor next year.
The 5th District includes most of
Oklahoma County and Potawatomie and Seminole counties.
Republican candidates have been busy talking down liberals, but their main opponents are fellow conservatives in a district that votes heavily Republican and hasn’t elected a Democrat since 1976 (though the district has been redrawn three times since then).
No Democrat has announced as a candidate in the race.
James Lankford, a youth camp director from
Edmond, had the third highest fundraising total of the 5th District candidates; he collected $59,350, tapping clergy members, church workers, educators, contractors and others.
Dr. Johnny Roy of Edmond raised $33,455, with $20,000 of that coming from a personal loan and much of the rest from other physicians;
Rick Flanigan of
Bethany raised $543
Roy and Calvey also ran for the seat in 2006, when Fallin emerged from another crowded Republican field.
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