In campaign money race, Romney wins October, Obama leads overall

Mitt Romney and his Republican allies raised more than President Barack Obama and the Democrats in the first 17 days of October as both presidential campaign efforts approached the $1 billion mark, with Obama in the lead, disclosures showed on Thursday.   

The tight 2012 presidential race has become the costliest in U.S. history thanks to massive spending on advertising and get-out-the-vote efforts by the campaigns and by outside groups that have no fundraising limits.  

After several months of lagging Obama in fundraising, Romney, the Republican National Committee and allied state parties overtook their Democratic rivals in October with $111.8 million raised from Oct. 1 to 17, his campaign said, a period that included two of the three televised presidential debates.   

Obama's campaign raised $90.5 million for itself and Democratic Party allies during that period, becoming the first in history to raise a total of more than $1 billion for an election effort together with his party.    Romney and the RNC were close behind, taking in a total of $919.4 million throughout the 2012 campaign so far.   

Obama's campaign hedged on the $1 billion figure, saying the total was still short of that mark - at about $988 million - based on a tally of the cash raised since April 4, 2011, when Obama's team and the party officially became one campaign.   

Reuters totals are based on a more commonly used calculation method that includes campaign funds starting on April 1, 2011, and party efforts dating back to Jan. 1, 2011.   

"As the Romney campaign and their super PAC allies continue to outspend us on the air, we're making every effort to expand our donor base heading into the final stretch," said Obama campaign spokesman Adam Fetcher.   

Romney's campaign said it had $169 million left in its own and the party's bank accounts at the end of Oct. 17 - a hefty sum for use in the last leg of campaigning before the Nov. 6 election and more than the $123.9 million available to Obama and the Democrats.  

"There are less than two weeks left, but we still have much hard work to do to ensure that Mitt Romney and (running mate) Paul Ryan win in November and bring real change to Washington," said Spencer Zwick, Romney's national financial chairman.   

With the two men running neck and neck in polls, Thursday's money disclosures are the last glimpse into the campaigns' finances before Election Day.   

"In an election this close, they're certainly going to try to put every dollar to use," said Anthony Corrado, campaign finance expert and government professor at Colby College in Maine. "They're building up cash because they want to have as much money as they can for the big final push."   

Obama voted early in Chicago on Thursday to encourage other Democrats to do so as both campaigns were in a hectic last-minute dash through the handful of crucial states seen as determining this year's winner.


REUTERS