You’re exactly right. McCain had $20million of leftover presidential money to play with. With the money disparity he enjoyed, he could have beat Reagan. How many of those who are condemning the stupid voters of Arizona answered the call to support JD when FR called for it?
Hard to overcome money like that but it is not fair, the zombie simply bought the primary.
McCain used public financing for his Presidential general election campaign.
I shouldn’t be so flippant. THere is no validity to the $20 million number.
According to his opposition: “According to his campaign finance reports, McCain transferred a whopping $4.65 million in Presidential money to his Senate race.”
This was from his “compliance fund”, which was set up to help pay for things unrelated to the direct campaign. McCain couldn’t spend this money on direct campaigning, becausse he took public funding. But there are some get-out-the-vote things you can do, and also you can use the money to fight ballot recounts in close elections.
Obviously, this wasn’t a close election, and there were no challenges to fund.
McCain is a major player in Senate politics, and was easily able to raise millions of dollars in campaign contributions. It is false to claim that the full $20 million came from some presidential fund. The total was under $5 million.