Mitt Romney raised $18.25 million in the second quarter — far more than Herman Cain ($2.4 million), Newt Gingrich ($2 million), Jon Huntsman ($4.1 million), Ron Paul ($4.5 million), or Tim Pawlenty ($4.2 million) did during the same period. Michele Bachmann, meanwhile, will announce her fundraising totals on July 15.
Although Romney is ahead of his rivals, he may be behind his own goalposts. According to the Wall Street Journal’s Jonathan Weisman, a Romney donor in March said the ex-governor’s goal was to raise $50 million by early summer. Others, however, said that number was a primary-season objective and “not what he needed out of the gate.”
GOP 12’s Christian Heinze adds that “over half of what [Romney] raised this quarter came from that single-day $10 million telethon.” And $18.25 million is still less than the $20 million he raised in the second quarter of 2007.
That said, Romney is mostly accumulating — not spending. In the second quarter of 2007, he had loaned his campaign a total of $8.9 million and burned through 98.8 percent of his receipts for that period. This time, he didn’t give his campaign any money, and his burn rate was only 31 percent.