McCain camp raises $22M in June

Barack Obama hasn’t revealed his fund-raising total for June.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican presidential candidate John McCain raised more than $22 million in June, his best fund-raising performance of the year, and ended the month with nearly $27 million cash on hand.

Campaign manager Rick Davis said Thursday that McCain and the national Republican Party together entered July with about $95 million in the bank. The Republican National Committee, which has been raising money jointly with Mc- Cain, collected nearly $26 million in June and had nearly $69 million on hand, officials said.

The campaign’s fundraising has given McCain the ability to spend more on television advertising than Democrat Barack Obama in key battleground states. Davis said about half of its income had been spent on television advertising.

Obama has not revealed his June fundraising.

In announcing McCain’s fundraising, Davis portrayed the campaign’s financial position as far brighter than ever before. He said the joint RNC-McCain fundraising through direct mail is now exceeding President Bush’s direct mail fundraising in 2004.

“We will have significant resources to prosecute a campaign that is very robust,” Davis said.

The McCain and Obama campaigns have significantly different fund-raising calculations to make.

McCain has agreed to take public financing in the fall, limiting him to about $84 million in spending for campaign activities. That means he will have to rely on the Republican Party to spend more to help his bid.

Obama has chosen to reject the public funds, the first major party candidate to do so in the general election in three decades. Obama is counting on raising far more than the $84 million he would be allotted by the taxpayer-financed presidential fund. Though McCain must spend any money he raises now by the end of August, Obama does not. The Democratic senator could save that money to boost his general election spending.

“They have to determine whether they will husband their primary dollars to be used in the general election, or spend down their primary dollars to keep pace with our spending,” Davis said.

Obama’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment on Davis’ assessment. Campaign officials would not discuss their advertising strategy.

Besides their own spending, however, both sides have begun to see increased advertising by outside groups. A group of veterans supporting McCain’s stance on the war in Iraq began running ads this week in some battleground states. The AFL-CIO also has an anti-McCain ad campaign in similar states.