US election:
Big donors bet on both horses By Emad
Mekay
WASHINGTON - Four of the 10 most lavish
contributors to the George W Bush and John Kerry
presidential campaigns are the same financial-services
corporations, says a new analysis of campaign
fundraising released on Tuesday.
According to
the Washington-based Center for Public Integrity, a
non-partisan think-tank, President Bush and his
Democratic challenger now share nearly half of their
biggest donors, suggesting that the companies are hoping
to cement a friendly relationship with whoever wins the
White House in November.
By historical
standards, the race is too close to call. A USA
Today/CNN/Gallup poll showed Bush leading at 52%, Kerry
at 45% and independent candidate Ralph Nader at 1% among
likely voters. However, Bush's lead was within the
survey's error margin on the North American Labor Day
(this past Monday), the traditional start of the
campaign's final leg.
"Conventional theories in
campaign finance state that you always want to have
money on the winning horse," said Alex Knot, one of the
authors of the report. "If there are any favors that are
granted for those that contribute, the investment of a
couple hundred thousand dollars is nothing compared
[with] the windfalls of billions in legislation."
Until this cycle, most of Kerry's top
contributors had come from the telecommunications
industry and law firms. Most of Bush's largest donors
are financial corporations with executives who have
pledged to raise money for the president's re-election.
"While the 2004 ballot is setting up to be one
of the most divisive elections in history, campaign
contributors to the candidates are looking more similar
than ever," said the report.
"What we are seeing
is a different trend in fundraising where financial
organizations that once exclusively favored Republicans
are now also favoring Kerry," said Knot. "There are a
few reasons why this could be taking place. One of the
most intriguing theories is that these companies are
hedging their bets."
Bush's top career patrons
are financial powerhouses such as Morgan Stanley Dean
Witter & Co, Merrill Lynch & Co Inc and
PricewaterhouseCoopers. Kerry's largest career donors
are Harvard University, Time Warner, and law firm Mintz,
Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo.
The
White House has repeatedly been criticized for the
perception that it rewards corporate interests at the
expense of ordinary Americans. The center says donors
have an interest in continuing that trend.
"The
10 largest donors to Bush during the cycle are all
financial institutions," said Knot. "So obviously they
care about or have an interest in some of the things
that Bush has an interest in. Some of these could be the
three tax cuts that Bush has put in place during his
first term."
The largest of the cuts that would
affect these corporations would be the cuts on capital
gains and dividends, as many of these companies have a
large amount of investment income. Bush has also
promised to make those cuts permanent and has floated
the idea of privatizing social security, a pension plan
for the elderly, and investing the funds in the stock
market.
Companies that gave money to both
campaigns gave more to Bush than to Kerry. Citigroup,
for example, gave Kerry US$169,254 and Bush $246,645.
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co gave Bush $486,125
while giving only $100,204 to Kerry, and Goldman Sachs
Group gave the Republican campaign some $295,950 while
giving the Democratic camp only $127,750. Bush netted
$368,900 from UBS AG Inc while Kerry received $138,700.
Knot explained the lion's share going to Bush on
the grounds that Kerry spent a shorter period of time
raising money as the official nominee of his party, and
that Bush already has a record of being friendly to
corporations.
According to the center, these
powerful companies are backing the election of already
wealthy candidates. Financial-disclosure forms show that
the two main contenders are millionaires, though none
can use more than $50,000 of his own money unless he
opts out of federal matching funds.
Kerry and
his wife Teresa Heinz Kerry have a disclosed worth of as
much as $747 million, but the most that Kerry can
personally lay claim to is $14.8 million of those
assets. The bulk of the fortune belongs to Heinz Kerry,
though the two do hold some assets jointly, says the
report.
The next-wealthiest household belongs to
Richard and Lynn Cheney, whose personal assets together
amount to as much as $111.2 million.
Kerry's
running mate John Edwards discloses the upper end of his
family's wealth at $44.6 million, and Bush rounds out
the field with some $18.9 million in assets.
Even third-party candidate Ralph Nader has as
much as $4.9 million, and reportedly earned more than
half a million dollars last year alone through speeches
and other activities.
