Lagging presumptive Democratic White House nominee Hillary Clinton in Kentucky and elsewhere, Donald Trump said he and the Republican National Committee raised nearly $51 million last month for his White House run and the RNC, after launching his first aggressive campaign to raise cash. The total disclosed yesterday dwarfed the $3.1 million he raised in May. Clinton, meanwhile, raised even more in June — $68.5 million — including $40 million for her campaign and $28 million for the Democratic National Committee, according to Reuters.
Trump’s and Clinton’s dollar figures weren’t broken down by state. In the last Federal Election Commission report, covering all of 2015 through May 31, the New York billionaire had taken in just $43,861 from Kentucky supporters. Clinton raked in 16 times as much: $709,377.
In a related development today in Cleveland, anti-Trump forces “are remarkably close” to getting past the first hurdle next week to force a vote on the party’s convention floor that would throw open the GOP contest again, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Although Donald Trump has a virtual lock on the GOP nomination for president, he’s at the back of the pack in campaign contributions from Kentuckians.
Trump and Clinton.
Newly released Federal Election Commission figures through May 31 show the New York billionaire has taken in just $43,861 in the 2015-2016 campaign cycle. The Democrats’ likely nominee, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has raked in 16 times as much: $709,377.
Viewed another way, of the 10 White House candidates who’ve raised the most money in the commonwealth, Trump has only received 3% of the GOP donations from Kentuckians. Clinton has gotten considerably more: 54% of Democrats’ total contributions:
Still, the Republican Party of Kentucky — led by Brown-Forman executive J. MacCauley Brown — says it isn’t worried about Trump’s weak fundraising. Spokesman Tres Watson told WFPL: “The RPK and Republican National Committee continue to raise significant funds and will have more than enough financial resources to win races up and down the ballot this fall.”
Nationwide, Clinton also has a huge fundraising advantage. She’s received $229.3 million vs. $63.1 million for Trump. That’s burdened him with the worst financial and organizational disadvantage of any major party nominee in recent history, according to The New York Times.
Trump began June with just $1.3 million in cash in the bank vs. more than $42 million for Clinton.
The value of U.S. Senator Rand Paul‘s stocks, real estate and other investments rose as much as 15% last year, according to a new analysis of his latest annual financial disclosure report.
Paul
The Kentucky Republican and former White House hopeful reported assets valued at between $670,000 and $2 million, based on the pre-set ranges members of Congress use in their public reports.
On the low side, that’s up 15% from $585,000 in 2014. On the high side, it’s up a smaller 11% from $1.8 million that year, according to the report and the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan campaign finance watchdog group in Washington. In 2014, Paul, 53, ranked No. 67 among the wealthiest senators, according to the center, which hasn’t published 2015 figures for yet. Boulevard arrived at the 2015 numbers in a recent review of his latest report, filed last month.
Paul’s report, as with other members of congress, also includes assets held by his wife Kelley Paul (photo, below) and their children. Most of the family’s investments were in stock and money market funds and real estate, with four valued as high as $250,000. There was one notable exception: a collection of silver coins valued at $15,001 to $50,000. Here’s Paul’s 2015 report, plus his 2014 report.
Paul is an ophthalmologist and U.S. senator since 2011. Earlier this year, he suspended his White House campaign after poor results in the GOP primaries.
His portfolio is dwarfed considerably by Kentucky’s other senator, Mitch McConnell. He and his wife valued their assets at between $9.6 million to $43.2 million last year. In 2014, he ranked 11th among the wealthiest members of the upper house. And Paul’s assets hardly amount to a rounding error compared to the overall richest member of Congress: Republican Rep. Darryl Issa of California, with an estimated $437 million. He built that fortune making car alarms.
Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell and his wife saw the value of their stocks, cash and other investments climb last year, cementing his status as one of the wealthiest U.S. senators, his new financial disclosure report shows. But the source of his riches — via his wife Elaine Chao‘s immigrant father — also demonstrates the fine line the senate majority leader must walk in supporting the GOP’s presumptive White House nominee: Donald Trump.
Senators make the finance reports public each year, valuing investments according to a predetermined range. In 2015, his portfolio was worth $9.6 million to $43.2 million, according to a new Boulevard analysis. On the low side, that was a 2% increase from 2014. On the high side: a whopping 23%.
The vast majority of McConnell’s wealth is held by his economist wife, Chao (photo with senator, top), whose father made a shipping trade fortune. Chao, 63, was U.S. labor secretary during the George W. Bush Administration.
Boulevard examined the senator’s latest report, filed May 16, to arrive at his 2015 estimates. The midpoint of their values would be $26.4 million vs. $22.2 million in 2014, according to figures compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan watchdog group in Washington that tracks political campaign finance. The center hasn’t published estimates for 2015 yet.
But in 2014, it ranked McConnell the 11th richest senator. No. 1: Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, with an average net worth of $243 million — a fortune he built investing in telecommunications. Here are the 25 richest.
Tripping over Trump
Chao’s parents fled to Taiwan from mainland China when the Chinese Communists seized power in 1949, according to Wikipedia. In 1961, when she was eight years old, Chao immigrated to the U.S. on a freighter with her mother and two younger sisters. Her father had arrived in New York three years earlier after receiving a scholarship. He later went on to launch shipper Foremost Group.
McConnell has offered tepid support to Trump at best, citing his inflammatory anti-immigration postures. In an interview with Yahoo Global News Anchor Katie Couric Tuesday, McConnell said the New York billionaire’s proposals could threaten the GOP’s standing with immigrant voters. “America is changing,” he told Couric, “the Republican Party clearly doesn’t need to write off either Asian or Latino Americans, and that is not a good place to be for long-term competitiveness.”
That’s Ben & Jerry’s co-founder Jerry Greenfield, who’ll give away free ice cream while campaigning for White House hopeful Bernie Sanders today at 3:30 p.m. at Fourth Street and Muhammad Ali Boulevard, according to WDRB.
Boulevard 