PIRG: Mortgaged House: Money Matters: Fattest Campaigns Usually Win

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Mortgaged House

H. Money Matters: Fattest Campaigns Usually Win

How important is money? Of the 66 current members who faced an opponent in the last general election, seven faced opponents who reported raising nary a dime. Rep. Mark Stiles, D-Beaumont, raised the most money to oppose a penniless candidate—$315,978. Not surprisingly, these penniless candidates did not put up much of a fight.⁷ When both sides did raise money, the winner typically raised many times more cash. The 24 races below had mind-numbing funding gaps. Rep. Edmund Kuempel, R-Seguin, raised 3,608 times more money than opponent Bill Utterback (who raised $50). Reps. Glen Maxey, D-Austin, Jesse Jones, D-Dallas, and Thomas Williams, R-Woodlands, raised over 100 times what their opponents banked (which was less than $1,200 each).

Winners With Colossal Funding Advantages

Dist.	Winner	Party	Winner $	Loser	Winner’s $ Advanta
45	Edmund Kuempel	R	$180,381	Bill Utterback	3608 X
51	Glen Maxey	D	$128,724	David Blakely	644 X
110	Jesse Jones	D	$23,669	Howard Bridges	237 X
15	Thomas Williams	R	$132,888	Peter Plotts	111 X
146	Al Edwards	D	$31,475	David Lee Fuson	79 X
106	Ray Allen	R	$72,184	J. David Gutierr	71 X
41	Roberto Gutierrez	D	$55,212	Javier Perez	70 X
47	Terry Keel	R	$192,677	John Lindell	39 X
143	Gerard Torres	D	$72,918	David McCullough	35 X
121	Bill Siebert	R	$225,465	Bette Graham Whi	33 X
145	Diana Davila	D	$35,198	Michael Bunch	30 X
120	Ruth Jones McClendon	D	$39,050	E. Thompson-Warr	30 X
100	Terri Hodge	D	$62,399	Joe Granado	27 X
25	Dennis Bonnen	R	$77,486	David Miller	27 X
19	Ron Lewis	D	$130,746	Jeff Van Fleet	20 X
49	Elliott Naishtat	D	$64,857	Emil Blomquist	19 X
37	Rene Oliveira	D	$97,441	Philip Cowen	18 X
1	Barry Telford	D	$117,564	George Lavender	18 X
12	Clyde Alexander	D	$228,333	Jerry S. Moon	17 X
40	Juan Hinojosa	D	$57,120	Emilio Santos	17 X
104	Domingo Garcia	D	$109,530	Monty Weddell	12 X
108	Carolyn Galloway	R	$41,269	Phil Bird	12 X
75	Gilbert Serna	D	$50,200	James Barnett	11 X
132	Scott Hochberg	D	$111,004	Ken Zimmern	11 X

Winners With 2 – 10 Times the Funding Advantage

Dist.	Winner	Party	Winner $	Loser	Winner’s $Advantag
85	Pete Laney	D	$1,068,818	Hollis Cain	10 X
36	Kino Flores	D	$53,136	Kathleen Holton	9 X
105	Dale Tillery	D	$77,146	Richard Stokley	9 X
137	Debra Danburg	D	$181,563	Chris LaRue	8 X
125	Arthur Reyna	D	$64,288	David Kirk	6 X
116	Leo Alvarado	D	$48,212	Donald Varella	6 X
144	Robert Talton	R	$98,837	Brooks Harrison	4 X
11	Todd Staples	R	$157,356	Doug Lowe	4 X
23	Patricia Gray	D	$175,004	Dave Norman	3 X
52	Mike Krusee	R	$51,076	Jerry Graham	2 X

The 10 members in the contested races above raised between two times and 10 times what their opponents raised. In contrast, the 18 candidates below had relatively modest financial advantages, raising less than two times what their opponents did.

Winners With 1 – 2 Times The Funding Advantage

Dist.	Winner	Party	Winner $	Loser	Winner’s $ Advanta
18	Allen Hightower	D	$153,670	Richard Ohendals	1.9 X
107	Harryette Ehrhardt	D	$214,368	Ernest Leonard	1.9 X
54	Suzanna Hupp	R	$173,832	Dick Miller	1.8 X
31	Judy Hawley	D	$139,144	Jim Gaines	1.8 X
138	Ken Yarbrough	D	$195,443	Dwayne Bohac	1.8 X
62	Ron Clark	R	$327,920	Roger Sanders	1.6 X
4	Keith Oakley	D	$156,487	Betty Brown	1.6 X
70	David Counts	D	$221,098	Scott McLaughlin	1.5 X
84	Carl Isett	R	$86,091	Don Richards	1.5 X
89	Sue Palmer	R	$158,907	Homer Dear	1.4 X
32	Gene Seaman	R	$221,355	Pat Eisenhauer	1.4 X
29	Tom Uher	D	$120,582	Donna Coleman	1.3 X
8	Paul Sadler	D	$106,062	Gene Barron	1.3 X
58	Arlene Wohlgemuth	R	$198,561	Bernard Erickson	1.2 X
27	Dora Olivo	D	$97,686	Bobby Mills	1.2 X
9	Wayne Christian	R	$189,736	Judy McDonald	1.2 X
59	Allen Place	D	$175,782	Becky Farrar	1.09 X
60	Jim Keffer	R	$115,456	John Cook	1.08 X

Of the 66 current House members who faced a general-election opponent, only seven members beat better-funded opponents. Candidates in two of these races ran in financial dead heats. Opponent James Hartley raised $107,992, just squeaking past the amount raised by Rep. Dan Kubiak, D-Rockdale. Ken Fleuriet raised $149,626, or just 1.1 times the money raised by Rep. Alec Rhodes, D-Dripping Springs.

Rep. Bob Glaze, D-Gilmer, however, pulled off a major upset. His losing opponent, Dan Flynn, raised an astonishing $295,310—or 3.4 times what Rep. Glaze raised. Democratic Reps. Jim McReynolds, Lufkin, and Jim Dunnam, Moody, also managed to best candidates who raised about twice the money that they did.

Rare Financial Upsets: Races in Which the Best-Funded Campaign Lost

Dist.	Winner	Party	Winner $	Loser	Loser’s $ Advantage	Winning% of Vote
5	Bob Glaze	D	$86,357	Dan Flynn	3.4 X	60
17	Jim McReynolds	D	$111,039	Billy Clemons	2.2 X	51
57	Jim Dunnam	D	$91,066	Barbara Rusling	1.9 X	59
20	Zeb Zbranek	D	$98,725	Kent Batman	1.6 X	53
28	Robert Cook	D	$113,958	Chip Rayburn	1.4 X	55
46	Alec Rhodes	D	$140,534	Ken Fleuriet	1.1 X	56
13	Dan Kubiak	D	$106,444	James Hartley	1.01 X	59

In their well financed attempt to seize a House majority, Republicans aggressively targeted open seats and vulnerable Democratic incumbents. Democrats won all seven races involving financial upsets. All seven of these were competitive races in which the winner took from 51 percent to 60 percent of the vote. The only two incumbents toppled in these financial upsets were Republicans running in heavily Democratic districts. Challenger Jim McReynolds beat incumbent Billy Clemons after the latter switched from the Democratic to the Republican ticket. Similarly, Jim Dunnam beat Barbara Rusling, who was an incumbent Republican running in a heavily Democratic district.⁸

The seven Democrats who pulled off these rare financial upsets clearly were the exceptions to the general rule whereby whoever raises the most money wins.

⁷ The other members who faced penniless opponents are all Republicans: Reps. Charlie Howard, Delwin Jones, Will Hartnett, Kent Grusendorf, Beverly Woolley and Talmadge Heflin.

⁸ Rusling earlier prevailed against long-time Democratic incumbent Betty Denton, whose campaign was marred by financial scandals. Denton was sentenced to six months probation and a $2,000 fine in 1995 for reporting false campaign funds in what was apparently an attempt to discourage challengers.