Romney, GOP spring ahead in fundraising

WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON Mitt Romney outraised President Barack Obama in May, the first time the Republican presidential challenger has jumped ahead of Obama and his prodigious fundraising apparatus. The numbers illustrate how Romney and the Republican Party have jelled as a force after a protracted GOP primary.

Other developments

Automatic defense cutslooming in January would be more devastating than previously feared and make it impossible for President Barack Obama to refocus his national-security strategy, a bipartisan group of former lawmakers and retired military officers said Thursday. Members of the Bipartisan Policy Center painted a dire picture for the nation's economy, the military and large and small defense contractors if the automatic reductions occurred on Jan. 2, 2013. Based on a special task force's calculations, the group said the cuts would mean an indiscriminate, across-the-board 15 percent reduction in programs and activities within the military, not the 10 percent that had been estimated.

Scoffing at a White House veto threat, the House voted Thursday to repeal a tax on medical-device makers that Republicans cast as a job-killing levy that would stifle an innovative industry. Lawmakers approved the measure 270-146, with 37 Democrats from states with a heavy presence of medical- equipment makers like Minnesota, New York and California joining all 233 voting Republicans. Most Democrats said the bill was yet another GOP attempt to weaken President Barack Obama's health-care overhaul, which created the tax to help pay for that law's expansion of health-care coverage to 30million Americans.

A group seeking to recall Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder announced Thursday that it has ended the effort following Gov. Scott Walker's victory in Wisconsin's recall election. The group called Michigan Rising said it will stop collecting signatures, noting it already was short of its own gathering goals. Instead, the group said it will focus on a long-term effort to form a progressive think tank, develop progressive leaders and support current progressive legislators.

-- Wire services

Romney and his party raised more than $76 million last month, the campaign said Thursday. Obama's campaign reported that it and the Democratic Party raised $60 million for the month.

Obama, forced onto the defensive by lackluster employment numbers, launched a television ad Thursday in nine key election-year states targeting Congress and blaming lawmakers for not acting on his job proposals. The approach represents an expanded ad focus for Obama, who had been going after Romney.

The fundraising numbers and Obama's new ad signal a new stage in the campaign as a resurgent Romney capitalizes on his emergence as the GOP's standard-bearer and as Obama is forced to confront the political implications of a weak economic recovery.

"We got beat," Obama campaign manager Jim Messina wrote bluntly in an e-mail to supporters, urging contributors to step up their giving.

For Romney, the latest figure represents a significant jump in fundraising. He and the GOP brought in $40 million in April, just short of the $43.6 million the Democratic president and his party raised that month. What's more, Romney is getting a significant boost from Republican-leaning super PACs that have raised far more and spent far more than their Democratic-leaning counterparts.

Romney, stepping up his criticism of Obama, campaigned and was raising money Thursday in Missouri. In a speech at a factory in St. Louis, Romney accused Obama not only of a failure of policy but of "a moral failure of tragic proportions."

Citing millions of unemployed or underemployed Americans, Romney said that Obama nevertheless claimed he was doing a great job.

"I will not be that president of doubt and deception," he said.

Asked afterward to comment on topping Obama in fundraising, Romney said only: "Long way to go."

Obama was mixing more fundraising with official business Thursday as he wrapped up a two-day West Coast trip that included four fundraisers on Wednesday. He started the day under a sweltering sun in the Los Angeles area at a breakfast fundraiser for about 300 people. Tickets started at $2,500.

Later, addressing about 2,500 college students at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Obama picked up on the theme of his latest campaign ad and blamed congressional inaction for the lack of additional job growth.

"If they had taken all the steps I was pushing for back in September, we could have put even more Americans back to work. We could have sliced through these headwinds more easily," Obama said.

Obama campaign officials noted that Romney's fundraising surge could be temporary and that it reflects his recently sealed standing as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, which allows him to raise more general election money. It also lets him raise money jointly for his campaign and for the Republican Party.

The Obama officials pointed out that Democratic presidential challenger John Kerry briefly experienced a similar surge in fundraising over President George W. Bush in the spring of 2004 after Kerry had locked up the nomination.

In his e-mail, Messina sought donations of $3 or more to "close the gap" against Romney in fundraising.

"More people giving a little bit is the only way to compete with a few people giving a lot,'' he said. So, let's fight like hell and win this thing."

Obama has been an active fundraiser and lately has stepped up the number of events he holds with donors. As of Thursday, the president has done 153 fundraisers since filing as a candidate for re-election on April 4, 2011, according to statistics kept by CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller. During same period in the 2004 election cycle, Bush had participated in 79 fundraisers.

In all, Obama and the Democratic National Committee and other state-focused funds have hauled in more than $500 million during the 2012 election campaign, compared with more than $480 million for Romney and the Republican Party.

The Romney campaign reported that the party and the campaign had $107 million cash on hand at the end of May. Obama's campaign did not list its comparable figure on Thursday, but last month, it reported $115 million in the bank through the end of April, with the DNC listing $24 million in hand.

Obama's new ad does not mention congressional Republicans, but its target is clear. Republicans have proposed their own measures aimed at creating jobs and have blocked several Obama proposals to promote hiring of teachers and police officers and to increase infrastructure projects. Obama has proposed paying for those measures with tax increases on wealthier taxpayers, an idea Republicans reject.

The ad is airing in the key presidential-election states of Colorado, Florida, Iowa, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia. The campaign declined to reveal how much it was spending on the ads, saying only that it was a "significant" purchase of air time.

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Religion, Race and Romney's Road Ahead

Beyond our post yesterday on whether Newt Gingrich is siphoning votes from Rick Santorum, three other fascinating areas emerge from the exit polls and other recent survey data on the Republican presidential contest. The subjects: Religion, race, and Mitt Romney's apparent inability to light a fire.

First, religion. With the Alabama and Mississippi primaries approaching, the question will be starker than ever: What is it with Romney and evangelicals?

The answer is twofold: First, exit poll results demonstrate that the belief structure of many evangelical voters leads them away from Romney, a Mormon. At the same time, the data are variable enough to suggest that this doesn't reflect flat rejection of Romney by evangelicals - rather, a preference to look elsewhere, given another option.

Generally, it's a clear problem for Romney. He lost evangelicals by 19 points in Tennessee, 18 points in Michigan, 18 points in Iowa and 17 points in Ohio, while winning non-evangelicals in those states by 18, 18, 12 and 15 points, respectively. In Georgia and South Carolina, Romney lost evangelicals by 32 and 22 points, while running about evenly among non-evangelicals. In Florida and Arizona, he ran evenly with his closest competitor among evangelicals, while winning non-evangelicals by 27- and 36-point margins.

Combining results across all states in which we've had exit or entrance polls, Romney's done 19 points better among non-evangelical than among evangelical voters. It's among the few most consistent gaps in his support profile across the 2012 contest to date.

A related result underscores the reason: Evangelicals are vastly more likely than other GOP voters to say it's very important to them to support a candidate who shares their religious beliefs. In the eight states where that question has been asked, Romney's won a mere 19 percent of these strongly religion- focused voters.

This does not bode well for Romney in Alabama and Mississippi; evangelicals accounted for 77 and 69 percent of voters in the 2008 GOP primaries there, among their highest proportions anywhere. And with Santorum and Gingrich on the ballot this year, they do have elsewhere to go.

But the last point is a key one, because where evangelicals don't feel they have elsewhere to go, they've been more accepting of Romney. As I noted yesterday, he won 62 percent of evangelicals in Virginia, where the only other choice was Ron Paul; it's the first and only state where he actually did better among evangelicals than among non-evangelicals. In our ABC/Post pre-election polling, moreover, few evangelicals have ruled out Romney entirely, and many instead cite him as their second choice.

If Romney prevails for the nomination, then, the likely question won't be whether he wins white evangelicals against Barack Obama - but the extent to which he can inspire them to turn out.

RACE - Then there's race. The sentence above pivots from "evangelicals" in a discussion of the GOP primaries to "white evangelicals" in a discussion of the general election. That's because, in the Republican primaries, it's almost redundant. In states for which we have exit and entrance polls, 91 percent of Republican voters to date have been white. If we exclude two states, Florida and Arizona, that goes to 96 percent.

While that's typical for Republican primaries, it runs contrary to the increasing racial diversity of the nation's electorate more broadly. The share of whites in general election for president has declined from 90 percent in the 1976 to 74 percent in 2008. Obama lost whites by 12 points in 2008, about the average for a Democratic candidate; he won the election on the strength - and increasing size - of the minority vote.

It's a point worth considering, not just for the 2012 general election but for the future of the Republican Party beyond. If minorities by and large are not participating in the party's primaries, will they tune into its candidates later? Given the country's demographic trends, it increasingly matters.

AND THE FIRE - Finally there's the related question of Romney's ability to light a fire under his voters. His campaign's appropriately been described as lackluster. One interesting example is Romney-friendly Vermont. Independent voters surged to the polls there Tuesday, increasing their share of the state's GOP primary electorate from 23 percent in 2008 to 40 percent this year.

But they did not turn out for Romney: Seven in 10 Vermont independents showed up to vote for someone else. And in general elections, independents customarily are the quintessential swing voters.

Romney campaign officials pushed back this week by pointing out that his favorability rating in national polls is no worse than Bill Clinton's was at this time in 1992 - yet Clinton turned those views around sufficiently to win his party's nomination, and then two terms in office.

It's true enough - but with a cherry-picking alert. In ABC/Post data, Clinton at this point in 1992 was seen favorably by 39 percent of Americans; Romney's currently seen favorably by 35 percent, about the same. But one thing to note is that March 1992 was a month and a half after the first controversy over Clinton's sexual escapades had erupted, the Gennifer Flowers affair. Romney's favorability is 4 points lower without any such scandal. Romney's unfavorable rating, moreover, is 14 points higher than Clinton's was then, scandal and all.

The number of Americans who see Romney favorably is lower than it was for any leading presidential candidate at about this point (in winter or springtime ABC/Post data) in 2008, 2004, 2000, 1996 and 1992 alike. Of all those candidates - both George Bushes, Clinton, Bob Dole, Al Gore, John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Obama - only one was underwater in approval, as Romney is now. That was Hillary Clinton, who ultimately did not prevail.

This in no way predicts Romney's future. But it means he's got his work cut out for him, for sure. The question: Whether the turnaround skills he learned in business will work in politics, too.

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Romney makes a show of force ahead of SC primary (AP)

By THOMAS BEAUMONT and JIM DAVENPORT, Associated Press Thomas Beaumont And Jim Davenport, Associated Press – Thu Jan 5, 8:46 pm ET

CHARLESTON, S.C. – Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney made a strong play for votes in conservative South Carolina's primary on Thursday, campaigning there with two popular politicians who are backing his bid instead of remaining in New Hampshire ahead of its first-in-the-nation primary next week.

"He's got to do some work," South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley told reporters after appearing with Romney and Sen. John McCain, the party's 2008 presidential nominee. "He's got to get on the ground, and with his message, he can win."

While the rest of the GOP field was in New Hampshire, Romney continued to show confidence by bolting for a state that doesn't cast primary votes until Jan. 21.

McCain touted Romney's family and support for military strength, key issues in South Carolina, where Christian conservatives and military veterans are influential in the GOP.

"As President Reagan said, `Peace through strength.' That's what Mitt Romney is committed to," McCain, a decorated Navy veteran and former prisoner of war, told more than 400 people.

McCain drew chuckles from the audience with a slip of the tongue near the close of his speech. "And so I am confident with the leadership and backing of the American people, President Obama will turn this country around," he said, inadvertently referring to the Democratic incumbent before repeatedly correcting himself with a grimace.

McCain has contacted supporters of his 2008 campaign who have endorsed other candidates, including former state Attorney Gen. Henry McMaster, who is backing Romney rival Jon Huntsman.

McMaster declined to say whether McCain asked him to switch his support, but he said McCain's backing will help Romney in the state where he placed a disappointing fourth in the 2008 primary.

In 2008, after campaigning hard and advertising aggressively in South Carolina, Romney saw little movement in his sluggish poll numbers and abandoned his bid in the state two weeks before the primary to focus on later primaries.

Romney has begun running advertisements and has locked up the endorsements of key figures, such as Haley and state Treasurer Curtis Loftus, a leader among the state's tea party supporters.

His visits have targeted the state's larger urban areas, which include more politically moderate transplants from other states, like Tom Kelly, a retired Air Force officer from Charleston who lived in Massachusetts when Romney was governor.

"He's standing on his record this time, not running so hard as a conservative. It's more authentic, and how we knew him in Massachusetts," said Kelly, who attended Romney's campaign event near Charleston.

It's a strategy similar to his plan in Iowa last year: Build on existing relationships, project a national image and ramp up late with the look of a top contender.

As in Iowa, some evangelical conservatives in South Carolina distrust Romney because of his changed positions on key social issues and voice discomfort with his Mormon faith. Some believe that Mormons falsely claim to be Christians.

Haley said she believes Romney's religion will not keep people from supporting him.

"This is a state that elected a 38-year-old Indian female. No, I'm not worried about that at all," Haley told reporters.

Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who finished nearly even with Romney in Iowa, has strong backing from evangelical conservatives. He also has campaigned aggressively in South Carolina, compared with Romney, having visited 26 times. Romney was making his eighth and planned to campaign with McCain in the state Friday.

Santorum was set to pour money into South Carolina advertising beginning next week. Fresh off his strong showing in the Iowa caucuses, he raised $2 million in the two days since the leadoff caucuses, aides said.

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