WASHINGTON – Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is a PAC rat who spent most of her massive HILLPAC political-action committee’s cash stash on herself rather than to help other Democrats, a new analysis shows.
Clinton (D-N.Y.) has the biggest federal PAC of any Democrat in Congress and spent $3.3 million last year but gave only 31 percent to other candidates. The rest went for her own staff, office, travel, direct mail and political consultants, the Hill newspaper found.
“It looks like she’s building a national network . . . The assumption on the part of many people is that this is the beginning of laying the groundwork for a presidential campaign for the future,” said Larry Noble of the Center for Responsive Politics, a watchdog group.
By contrast, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) raised less than half as much but gave a much bigger share – 70 percent – to other candidates.
Clinton’s PAC spending is more like 2004 Democratic presidential candidates Rep. Dick Gephardt (Mo.), Sen. Joe Lieberman (Conn.) and Sen. John Edwards (N.C.), whose PACs are all giving a small share to other candidates – in Edwards’ case, just 7 percent.
HILLPAC director Patty Solis Doyle said overhead costs are high because it’s a new PAC and needed phones, desks and computers. She denied it’s a pre-presidential committee, saying: “HILLPAC was founded to elect other Democrats.”
She added Clinton gave more money to other candidates from a separate, far smaller New York PAC, HILLPAC NY, which raised $305,000 and gave away 86 percent of it.
Because the federal HILLPAC is so big, Clinton is one of the top donors to other Democrats across the country – thus building up chits for the future – even though over two-thirds of the money went for her own expenses.
Some of HILLPAC’s biggest donations invite presidential speculation – like $30,000 to Democrats in Iowa, whose early caucuses are the first presidential test.
HILLPAC gave $10,000 to the Iowa Democratic party, another $10,000 to the Democratic governor plus $10,000 to Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).
She gave to 28 Senate candidates, mostly the PAC maximum of $10,000 – but only $5,000 to her husband’s former chief-of-staff, Erskine Bowles, because she wouldn’t get involved in his primary. He won the nomination but lost the North Carolina Senate race to Republican Elizabeth Dole.
The leader who gave by far the smallest share to others was the campaign finance reformer-in-chief Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), whose PAC spent 98 percent on his own travel, consultants and overhead – and gave just 2 percent to fellow Republicans.
Critics say personal PACs like HILLPAC let lawmakers double-dip and effectively exceed legal limits by raising funds twice from the same source – once for their own campaign and once for the PAC – then using both stashes to boost themselves.
WHO GAVE HOW MUCH
PAC politician Total Spent Donations Percentage on donations
House Dem leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) $1,711,758 $1,192,000 70%
Senate GOP leader Bill Frist (Tenn.) 981,614 472,035 48%
House Speaker Dennis Hastert (D-Ill.) 1,758,588 793,500 45%
Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) 3,306,634 1,037,000 31%
Rep. Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.) 1,477,136 369,000 25%
Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) 2,668,805 553,577 21%
Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) 2,760,286 193,425 7%
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) 2,835,527 62,320 2%
Source: The Hill newspaper based on Federal Election Commission reports