US Chamber of Commerce Spends Millions in Multi-Pronged Attack

Time to introduce a new weekly feature to Davemanuel.com called the "Weekly SuperPAC Spending Report". This report will be released every Friday afternoon.

In the "Weekly SuperPAC Spending Report", we'll look at the spending of all of the SuperPACs over the past seven days. Who spent the most? Which candidate was targeted the most? How much was spent by SuperPACs in total?

If you are wondering what a "SuperPAC" is, here is a definition from our SuperPAC page:

'The "superPAC" is like a traditional PAC (Political Action Committee) without many of the restrictions. For instance, a "superPAC" can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money for the sole purpose of supporting or opposing political candidates.

A "superPAC" can directly attack a political candidate. The only caveat is that a "superPAC" is not allowed to coordinate directly with candidates or political parties.'

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Over the past seven days, the FEC (Federal Election Commission) listed a total of 167 SuperPAC expenditures. In total, SuperPACS spent $13,865,671 in the past week.

Here were the top ten most active SuperPACs:

US CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, $5,933,461
TEXAS CONSERVATIVES FUND, $1,440,000
Priorities USA Action, $1,160,023
Majority PAC, $979,095
CLUB FOR GROWTH ACTION, $644,355
American Crossroads, $595,750
SENATE CONSERVATIVES ACTION, $510,650
Prosperity For Michigan, $426,237
Now or Never PAC, $217,675
SEIU COPE (Service Employees International Union Committee On Political Education), $184,513

The US Chamber of Commerce was particularly active as they launched a multi-pronged attack against the likes of Bill Nelson, Tim Kaine and Sherrod Brown.

As you can see, the US Chamber of Commerce posted four of the five largest expenditures in the past seven days:

US CHAMBER OF COMMERCE spent $1,666,461 to oppose Nelson, Bill
Type: Television buy and production cost - Deciding

Priorities USA Action spent $1,062,302 to oppose Romney, Mitt
Type: Media TV Advertising Buy

US CHAMBER OF COMMERCE spent $1,000,000 to oppose Kaine, Tim
Type: Television Buy and Production cost - The Express

US CHAMBER OF COMMERCE spent $914,000 to oppose Brown, Sherrod
Type: Television buy and production cost - Own it

US CHAMBER OF COMMERCE spent $846,000 to oppose Baldwin, Tammy
Type: Television buy and production cost - Failure

American Crossroads spent $537,344 to oppose OBAMA, BARACK
Type: WEB ADS

SENATE CONSERVATIVES ACTION spent $500,650 to support CRUZ, RAFAEL EDWARD TED
Type: IE-Cruz-Media Buy

Majority PAC spent $465,920 to oppose Allen, George
Type: Media Buy

TEXAS CONSERVATIVES FUND spent $415,000 to oppose CRUZ, RAFAEL
Type: PAC Advertising

TEXAS CONSERVATIVES FUND spent $400,000 to oppose CRUZ, RAFAEL
Type: PAC Advertising

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Here is some more on the US Chamber of Commerce's recent ad blitz, courtesy of ABC News.

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Now let's take a look at which candidates for various offices received the most support from SuperPACs over the past week:

RAFAEL EDWARD TED CRUZ, $724,008
CLARK DURANT, $426,237
Tulsi Gabbard, $167,475
DANIEL ROBERTI, $131,632
DAVID H DEWHURST, $115,000
CHRISTIE VILSACK, $113,179
KERRY BENTIVOLIO, $84,625
LAURA RUDERMAN, $59,193
Fredrick Upton, $50,000
Sarah Steelman, $44,634

And now, the candidates which had the most SuperPAC dollars directed AGAINST them over the past seven days:

Bill Nelson, $1,666,461
RAFAEL CRUZ, $1,440,000
Mitt Romney, $1,297,462
Tim Kaine, $1,000,000
Sherrod Brown, $914,000
Tammy Baldwin, $846,000
BARACK OBAMA, $781,118
DAVID H DEWHURST, $506,211
George Allen, $483,737
John Brunner, $448,159

As you can see, Super PACs spent $1,297,462 to oppose Mitt Romney over the past seven days, while $781,118 was spent to oppose Barack Obama.

Source: SuperPAC Spending