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As featured on p. 218 of "Bloggers on the Bus," under the name "a MyDD blogger."

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

CA-46, CA-50: Cook, Leibham Outraise Incumbents

Two more Democratic challengers have outraised their incumbent opponents in the second quarter. That doesn't happen very often, and it's not supposed to in the supposedly impenetrably gerrymandered state of California. But as I've been saying, this is a different year.

In CA-50, I've been informed that Nick Leibham outraised Brian Bilbray by $245K-$210K in the second quarter. From the release:

Challenger Nick Leibham raised more money than Congressman Brian Bilbray in this fundraising quarter, according to FEC reports. Leibham raised $245,504 while Bilbray managed $210,315. The quarter spanned from April 1, 2008-June 31, 2008.

“Any time that you out raise an incumbent, especially someone like Brian Bilbray who has taken over $180,000 in campaign contributions from Big Oil, it gives the campaign a huge amount of momentum,” said Leibham. “This is the clearest sign yet that the voters of the 50th are ready for change and I’m honored that so many of them are willing to contribute to our effort.”


Leibham has $266K cash on hand, compared to $528K for Bilbray.

In CA-46, there is similarly good news about Debbie Cook so I'll let it speak for itself:

Debbie Cook Raises More Than Rohrabacher For The Second Straight Quarter

Democratic Congressional nominee Debbie Cook announced today that she raised more campaign funds than Dana Rohrabacher in the latest reporting period, making it the second quarter in a row she’s out-raised the nine-term incumbent.

Cook, the Mayor of Huntington Beach, out-raised Rohrabacher by more than $10,000. Cook raised $92,900 to Rohrabacher’s $78,712.


Cook has $97K CoH. 70% of her donors are local, meaning she has grassroots support AND that she has limitless potential if she can tap into netroots energy and build a national fundraising base. She will be appearing at Netroots Nation.

Both of these are, in some respect, a reflection of two lazy incumbents. Bilbray and particularly Rohrabacher aren't paying any attention to fundraising. But there's not going to be any NRCC money forthcoming if these two get in trouble. There's not going to be any expansion of their donor base. So while both have cash reserves (Bilbray has about $528K CoH, Rohrabacher has $387K), they aren't overwhelming, and both Leibham and Cook ought to be somewhat competitive financially.

This is nothing like CA-26, where David Dreier has $1.9 million in the bank. (Russ Warner's numbers aren't out yet.)

More numbers:

CA-45: Bornstein raised a little over $96,000, has $121K CoH. No numbers for Mary Bono yet.
CA-03: Bill Durston raised around $125K, has $188K CoH. Nice haul for him. Dan Lungren raised $173K, has $615K CoH.
CA-52: Mike Lumpkin raised $128K but only has $53K CoH.

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