Jeb! Bush must be thanking his lucky stars that he raised the bulk of the cash haul for his Super PAC before he started opening his mouth on the campaign trail. Unfortunately for Jeb!, that's about all he has to be thankful for. Matea Gold reports:
The super PAC supporting Jeb Bush is racing through its massive war chest much faster than money is coming in, spending close to $50 million in a record blitz that has so far failed to lift the former Florida governor’s sputtering presidential candidacy.
The group, Right to Rise, has already gone through nearly half of the $103 million it brought in during the first half of the year, records show. It raised only about $13 million in the five months that followed, according to a person familiar with the figure.
Ouch. Basically, as soon as donors started getting a taste of Jebby on the trail, they bailed. He's got $67 million left and, even after dropping half a million on ads, his polling is still in the tanker at 4 percent.
The only people Jeb! managed to convince that things were going swimmingly were apparently Politico reporters and the donor they talked to for this story:
There’s one significant success that is keeping his campaign alive: Jeb Bush has convinced major GOP donors and supporters that the polls are wrong.
“I am like the Israelites following Moses, and I am not the only one,” said Mike Fernandez, the top donor to Bush’s super PAC, after a new CNN poll showed Bush an astounding 33 points behind the poll leader. “Unfortunately, it might not be that many of us.”
You can say that again, Mike. No word yet on whether Fernandez is actually “the only one.”