Apperently, some Democratic websites have been propagating the theory that since Obama spend money in Florida and Michigan, this is evidence he broke the pledge not to compaign there. However, there is no basis for this in the FEC filings.
The accusation is based on the following quote from the Center for Responsive Politics:
Although the Democrats weren't able to earn delegates in Michigan or Florida, because the states scheduled early primaries without the national party's blessing, the hopefuls still spent nearly $3.4 million in those states. Hillary Clinton and Obama each spent about $130,000 in Michigan while Obama spent $1.3 million in Florida—more than any other Democratic candidate and more than eight Republican candidates, who were eligible to win delegates from the state.
As noted in an update to the story at MyDD and Talk Left, the article prefaces this quote with:
Now would be a good time to mention that measuring spending in a state is problematic. The biggest expenses—advertising, for one—are often spent with vendors outside the state, or even just over the state line. These figures measure only what was spent on the ground with local companies and individuals.
although Jerome states he's "not sure what they mean by that."
The answer is straightforward. Essentially the only information on spending comes from the candidates FEC filings, which list itemized expenditures, including the full address of the recipient. One can, therefore, break this information down by state. The filings also include information on the category of the expense. In fact, I've downloaded them myself, and broken down the spending. This also reveals that the CRP apparently massively overestimated Obama's Florida expenditures.
Important notes: these numbers are essentially meaningless in terms of the question of violating the campaigning ban. Purchasing advertising in Florida would not necessarily be billed to a Florida address. It could also be paid for by credit card, which would conceal the location of the advertising. As a final caveat, these numbers cover the full year 2007, but not beyond that, as that's all that has been filed so far.
With that caveat, the numbers for Michigan are as follows.
Michigan:
Clinton: $130,519
Obama: $136,805
For Florida, the Obama campaign paid a massive $3.5 million dollars in American Express card fees to a location in Florida. (However, his campaign lists no current credit card debt, which is probably good given the interest on such a sum.) I have removed this from the numbers below.
Florida:
Clinton: $966,825
Obama: $453,853
I don't know how CPR arrived at the figure of 1.3 million -- without the American Express charges the number is too low, and with them, it is much too high.
In any case, my numbers suggest in terms of expenditures which can be directly linked to FL, Hillary spent about twice as much as Barack. This makes sense, given that Hillary has also raised about twice as much money in Florida ($5.9 million to $3.3 million).
A further quick peak at where all that Florida money is going. The majority is for payroll of salaried whose address happens to be in FL:
Clinton: $442,432
Obama: $177,107
This would probably be the place to look for campaigning-related activities, but the closest I can find is this, from Clinton's Florida finance manager:
We want to invite you to a very special opportunity to help and support Hillary’s campaign on the day after the Iowa caucuses. On Friday, January 4th, 2008, we will be hosting a "Hillary Hub" throughout the state of Florida. Win or lose in Iowa (hopefully win!), the campaign will put together call centers all across the country to build momentum and raise money between Iowa and New Hampshire.
which is, perhaps, pushing the boundaries of the prohibited "coordinating volunteer activities". I didn't do a thorough search here, however, but just googled the top few salaried Floridians for both campaigns.
Any sort of campaigning would presumably show up under the "events" category but of course, this also lists catering & equipment for permitted fundraising events:
Clinton: $209,280
Obama: $77,487
My understanding is that campaign finance limits requires campaigns to pay for any costs associated with a fundraising event beyond $4,000. So it's pretty easy to rack up some big bills here.
Another biggy is travel and lodging, presumably while on those delightful fundraising trips:
Clinton: $62,700
Obama: $82,480
And as an example of the reason why this isn't a good measurement of campaigning, Clinton paid $83,548 for polling to a firm whose headquarters happens to be located in FL -- but this obviously has no relevence to her performance in the FL elections.
Finally, let me note that the key category "advertising" does not show up for either MI or FL expenditures. Their FEC filings offer no direct evidence that either candidate engaged in campaigning in Florida or Michigan.