Mitt Romney/campaign financing



The following relates to campaign finance for Mitt Romney's candidacy for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

Political action committees
The New Commonwealth PAC first filed with the Internal Revenue Service the week of September 14, 2006. "This is a non-federal political action committee established to recruit and support candidates for state and local office who, by virtue of education, profession or experience, can demonstrate aptitude or likelihood of success in delivering efficient and effective government leadership and services to the citizens of Virginia," according to the IRS filing. The PAC's address is 3122 Woods Cove Lane, Woodbridge, VA.

OurSharedValues.org, also a 527 committee, first filed with the IRS the week of September 14, 2006, to "Engage in exempt functions."

In July 2006, according to RunMittRun.org, "a political organization supportive of Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s presidential bid," it and OurSharedValues.org "will fund and produce national media campaigns related to" religious bias, the "remarkable overall ignorance of the basic tenets of Mormonism", and that "Evangelical Christians have never had a candidate whose values and lifestyle more closely mirror their own."

Bundling
Public Citizen relaunched the WhiteHouseForSale website for the 2008 elections.


 * As of July 27, 2007, Mitt Romney had 230 bundlers for a total of $34,486,724.00 raised. Follow Mitt Romney's total funds raised and a list of bundlers and amount raised here.

Romney's bundlers

 * Matt Blunt, Governor of Missouri.


 * Chris Chocola, who was the sixth largest recipient of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's ARMPAC campaign contributions.


 * Dorothy Bush Koch, sister of President George W. Bush and a Bush Pioneer in 2000.


 * Howard Leach, a Bush Pioneer in 2000 who is one of several wealthy conservatives who are funding Freedom's Watch.


 * Stephen M. Lessing, Lehman Brothers, who was a Bush Ranger in 2004.


 * Carl H. Lindner, Jr., Bush Ranger in 2004.


 * David Neeleman: "Last week, Fox News’ Bill O'Reilly attacked Jetblue for working with 'the radical left' by sponsoring the upcoming YearlyKos convention, eventually forcing the company to remove its banner from the conventions website. [On July 26, 2007,] Public Citizen’s WhiteHouseForSale.org revealed that JetBlue founder David Neeleman is a bundler for Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. He also sits on Romney’s Connecticut statewide finance committee."


 * Bob Pence, Romney's National Finance Co-Chair and funder in 2006 of Vets for Freedom Action Fund.


 * Bob Perry, funder in 2004 of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth that attacked Democratic candidate John Kerry.


 * Mel Sembler, funder of Freedom's Watch.

Check the facts
FundRace 2008, The Huffington Post's searchable database: "FundRace makes it easy to search by name or address to see which presidential candidates your friends, family, co-workers, and neighbors are contributing to. Or you can see if your favorite celebrity is putting their money where their mouth is."

Campaign distributions

 * Matthew Yglesias, "Payola," The Atlantic, December 8, 2007.

External articles

 * "Mitt Romney's 'Quiet' Contributors: Neil Cavuto Ignores the Billionaire Candidate's Connections to Bain Capital, Carlyle Group, KKR and Clear Channel," News Hounds, April 5, 2007.
 * Kari Chisholm, "Mitt Romney's unethical fundraising program," Politics and Technology, April 15, 2007.