City Councilman Michael McMahon's camp says it has raised about $500,000 for his bid to capture disgraced Rep. Vito Fossella's seat, more than twice as much as his opponent for the Democratic nomination.
The McMahon campaign touted the deluge of donor dollars as proof that the term-limited councilman has the support to win the congressional seat, although the campaign won't officially file papers with the Federal Election Commission until the July 15 deadline.
McMahon's opponent for the Democratic nomination, Brooklyn lawyer Stephen Harrison, admitted that his campaign has raised far less -- between $160,000 and $180,000, according to his best estimate.
The second-quarter reporting deadline, which covers fundraising from April 1 to June 30, had both campaigns spinning the numbers yesterday.
McMahon's camp noted that the half-million was raised in only a few weeks, while Harrison said he's getting smaller donations from individual voters.
"If dollars could vote, he wins," said Harrison. "But they don't. It's a classic grassroots campaign against a machine campaign, and we'll see what happens." link
I think Harrison's campaign is right to phrase this in terms of grassroots vs. machine. There's no question that McMahon has been backed by the establishment and is raising money accordingly. In a change based election, Harrison reinforces Obama's message while McMahon somewhat contradicts it (as do any Democratic candidates who raise more money from PACs and lobbyists than from the individual contributors). I do think that Harrison's numbers are pretty bad, even for a grassroots candidate. You can't do much with $150,000 in the NYC media market. We'll have to analyze the specific numbers when they come in.
