It is absolutely a bad sign that Rudy Giuliani’s senior staff have decided to work without paychecks, and there is no way to spin it otherwise. The amount of money that’s involved is miniscule: about $50,000 per month.
So the campaign must really have a cash on hand problem. Breaking News: Giuliani’s national finance chair, Roy Bailey, no longer has that position with the campaign. Bailey was not only Giuliani’s finance chair, he was one of the founding partners of Giuliani’s consulting firm.
What’s going on in the Giuliani campaign? This can’t be good. I don’t quite understand it though. Wasn’t the purpose of pulling out of Iowa, New Hampshire, Michigan and South Carolina justified as necessary in order to hoard resources to make a last stand in Florida? And yet the campaign can’t make a $50,000 payroll?
January 11th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
LJ-
I agree with you. I don’t understand this at all. Excluding Mitt’s personal wealth, Rudy outraised every Republican in 2007. They didn’t play at all in Iowa. They played significantly in New Hampshire till mid-December, and then withdrew b/c his numbers weren’t moving. He’s not playing in Michigan, or SC. What are they doing with all of this money that they raised? Have they spent it all on Florida TV and mail?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
Metro….
TLG….
Tell me it ain’t so……
BEWARE….
The RETURN…..
January 11th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
It seems I see half a dozen Rudy ads every time I watch Fox News. Those can’t be cheap – unless they’re giving him a discount.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
Bad sign – the early state strategy backfired for Romney and hurt him, but Rudy was killed off by his early state strategy, the question now is wether John McCain and Huckabee are conservative enough to beat off Romney. I think the easiest guess is no, and we will have a split convention – if Huckabee can somehow exit the picture there may be a chance of avoiding the split convention wether it’s Romney winning or McCain winning, but as long as 3 or 4 people are sharing the pie, I think it’s next to impossible.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
I don’t even know if Mitt would want Rudy for the VP slot……
January 11th, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Rudy’s very very very bad day.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:05 pm
4-but where did the money go? Didn’t we all assume they were saving cash for big push in the big states?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
sombody repoerted rudy has 7 mil on hand
January 11th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Ambinder has not reported this accurately.
According to CBS:
Rudy Giuliani says his campaign will spend nearly all of the cash on hand they have left on the upcoming Florida primary contest.
Asked if he will have any money following the January 29th vote, the mayor said, “We’ll have some, but frankly, you know, Florida is real important to us, so we’re gonna put if not everything into Florida, almost everything.â€
The campaign announced that as of December 31, they had $7 million on hand for the primaries.
Giuliani took questions from the press today about reports that senior members of his staff have been asked to go without salaries for January and possibly upcoming months. Giuliani denied it was a request, and said staffers did it out of their own volition.
“Well some people volunteered to do it,†said Giuliani. “We didn’t ask anyone to do it. Some people volunteered to do it ‘cause they wanted to stretch out the money. We’ve got quite a bit of money and they wanted to make sure we had even more money for the end of this situation in Florida, so that we could have I guess enough on the air or whatever.â€
The campaign also announced that National Finance Co-Chairman for the Giuliani campaign, Roy Bailey, has not held that position for a month and is volunteering elsewhere in the campaign.
According to Fox:
Rudy Giuliani National Finance Co-Chairman Roy Bailey resigned his post late last month, campaign officials confirmed today.
Bailey still advises the campaign on an ad hoc/volunteer basis but resigned from the finance post (a volunteer/unpaid position) last month due to lack of time, a senior aide tells Fox.
“In order to concentrate on private business needs, he didn’t think it was it was fair to maintain the title if he had to reduce his time commitment, for example Roy had travelled a great deal as national chair and he can no longer do that. Roy and Rudy remain close personal friends,†added the official, denying that Bailey left the post due to any disputes over fundraising or the campaign’s financial predicament.
Jim Lee, the other national finance co-chair still holds his post–which entails overseeing the network of local organizers and mapping out the long-term fundraising outlook for the campaign. Bailey’s position has not been filled as of yet.
Campaign spokeswoman Maria Comella adds that no top officials within the campaign’s fundraising operation have left the campaign during the last 2 months.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Mitt and Fred (who isn’t going anywhere) are the two Conservatives….
Mitt vs. the Huckster (Pro-life lib)
Mitt vs. McCain (Indie-Maverick)
When are Republicans going to see the light
January 11th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Heh…I remember when news like this was coming out of team McCain just prior to his incredible near-demise.
Of course, the J-Mac’s back, but it took him 6 months. I don’t think Rudy has that luxury.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:10 pm
Obviously, if Rudy wins Florida, they will then have all the money coming in that they need to advertise in the expensive February 5 markets (NY, LA, SF, Chi).
January 11th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
And what happens if Rudy loses Florida? How long does he last?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
We need to see more polls. But if Rudy hss no money, and polls in FL lok this way, he won’t win.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
I wouldn’t choose Rudy if I were Mitt. But I would like an intelligent discussion of who would be Mitt’s running mate. Fred is a good guy, but he’s going to be out soon. So, we’re left with one man who is a social conservative, a fiscal liberal, and stupid on foreign affairs/national defense; 2) a man who is a moderate on social and fiscal policies, and pretty strong on foreign affairs/national defense; then 3) a man who represents all three legs of the Reagan coalition, and is probably the smartest guy we’ve had run in a very long time, if ever. Go Mitt Romney.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Abe,
Yesterday, I wrote:
Aron Goldman Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 8:56 pm
The Romney camp is of the belief that Huckabee will drop out after losing South Carolina to McCain.
Romney, after losing both Michigan and South Carolina, will then need Rudy to win Florida to kill McCain’s momentum, further muddy the field, and keep alive any lingering chance at the nomination. If Mitt were to play his cards right and, in his own self-interest, concede Florida to Rudy, the quid pro quo could come in the form of a VP slot for Romney, should Giuliani proceed to win the nomination on February 5. That would be Romney’s last best chance at furthering his political career, as it’s pretty safe to say that constitutionally-ineligible Austrian-born Schwarzenegger has a better shot at being chosen by McCain as running mate.
Today, Romney said: “I’m planning on picking up a gold in Michigan. If I do that, I’ll have a strong position for South Carolina and will be up heavy with ads here, also in Florida and Nevada. If I get another second in Michigan, we’ll have to re-evaluate which states we go to next. But this is the battle for the support of 50 states”
“I’m not going to stop investing and stop plowing ahead in these states as long as I’ve got a reasonable probability of being successful. And Super-Duper Tuesday, as it’s called, on Feb. 5, is coming up.”
Romney added: “I frankly don’t think that the nation is going to choose Senator McCain or Mike Huckabee to be the nominee.”
Could a Rudy-Romney alliance be in the works…?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:19 pm
Looks like the donating public didn’t see the wisdom of the big state strategy.
How’s he going to pay for Super Tuesday?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Aron,
Rudy would not pick Mitt….
Mitt would not pick Rudy….
Let’s get real….
They both would need very different V.P.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Aron
I’m not very familiar with the history of primaries. Does the kind of alliance you allude to happen very often?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:25 pm
My VP pick for Mitt is JC Watts. Not only does he bridge the religion, region and race gap, he is a GREAT guy, solid conservative and future president potential.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Aron #16: Could a Rudy-Romney alliance be in the works…?
Romney also does not mention Duncan Hunter as a candidate whom the nation will NOT choose, yet this is no implication of a Romney-Hunter alliance.
Perhaps when your guy doesn’t get mentioned, the real reason is that he is becoming irrelevant.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
The voting public doesn’t care. All that Rudy needs to do is campaign hard and put in lots of ads — and he’d better hope that the conservative base and media start reminding people of why they can’t choose John McCain!!!!!
January 11th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Yes, I’ve thought of JC Watts quite a lot myself. How is he on foreign affairs/national defense? It might be nice to have someone with lots of strength there. Would Gingrich take the position under Mitt? How would you like to debate against those two?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Consider…
Rudy’s campaign acknowledges they had $7 million COH at the end of December.
It costs roughly $1 million a week to run ads in Florida.
Rudy has run at least three different television ads (First Day, Super Bowl, and Liderazgo) for a week or two now in Florida, as well as running them on national cable news ads and radio ads.
Combine that massive ad buy ($2-$5 million?) with regular operating expenses of a campaign, and it’s fairly easy to see how they’ve gotten into a financial mess.
Rudy chose one of the most expensive firewalls in the entire country.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
TLG……
Is that 5 or 6 exclamation points there….
I thought I was the only hack around here that used that many….
BEWARE…
The RETURN!!!!!!
January 11th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Abe,
Rudy and Romney may well hate one another, but the situation is playing out where they might need to coalesce out of political necessity and mutual self-preservation.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Okay, that should have read:
“Rudy has run at least three different television ads for a week or two each now in Florida as well as running them on national cable news, and running radio ads as well.
Combine that massive ad buy ($3-5 million?)…”
January 11th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Aron
Did you see my question earlier? I’m trying to find out more about alliances that have happened in the primaries. Is it rare? Common?
January 11th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
Aron,
You’re possibly right….
I profess that I… know…. nothing…these days…
January 11th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
I don’t think anyone can predict anything right now.
John McCain’s rise is largely due to Independents.
I want the Republican Party to nominate their GOP candidate, not the MSM, not Independents and especially not the Democrats.
We have a long way to go. I wouldn’t be predicting anything right now.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
The hatred between Rudy and Romney pales in comparison (if it exists) to the hatred that McCain has for Romney. If Mitt has any chance at the nomination, he needs Rudy to take FL regarless what he does in MI.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:47 pm
Jack, huh? If Rudy wins FL, he wins CA, IL, NY, NJ, CT, etc, etc, etc.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Metro,
I didn’t say that Rudy does not have great chance to take the nomination if he takes FL. I was just saying that the only chance that Romney had is, if McCain is taking all the states, that Rudy takes FL. If McCain takes FL (along with the others), then Romney doesn’t have a chance at all.
January 11th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Again, Metro, you have proven to be my amusement for the day.
If this same sort of information were coming out of the Romney campaign, you would be shouting to the rooftops about how Mitt is dead. Now, I wouldn’t expect you to be that brutally honest about your boy, but a little objectivity out of you would be nice, after all the bile you have unloaded on Romney personally, as well as many of his supporters.
January 11th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
$7M is not dead.
January 11th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
In fact, it’s a lot better than the -$50M that is the Romney campaign.
January 11th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Metro,
I hate to break this to you, but Rudy isn’t leading in Florida. One of the key elements of a firewall is the being in the lead part. By this standard, New York almost doesn’t qualify. McCain is the political death of Rudy. As president, Rudy would be excellent and McCain would be a disaster….go figure.
January 11th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Dave, see my posts in the next thread.
January 11th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
It almost smells like a scandal brewing.