MD-Sen: Mfume's fundraising plummets

Bad news for Maryland Senate hopefull Kweisi Mfume.  His fundraising is, well terrible for someone who actually is polling pretty well.

This past quarter's numbers:

Ben Cardin (D): raised $925,000, cash on hand $2,300,000

Kweisi Mfume (D): raised $135,000, cash on hand $171,000

Michael Steele (R): raised $1,800,000, cash on hand $3,000,000

Even minor candidates have more money than Mfume...

Allan Lichtman (D): cash on hand $265,000

Dennis Rasmussen (D): cash on hand $280,000

Josh Rales (D): unknown.  He's a millionaire who's pledged to spend...millions...on the race.

Fortunately, the Green candidate shouldn't be too much of a spoiler

Kevin Zeese (G): raised $12,200, cash on hand $16,000

Source

Some more bad tidbits from the article:

U.S. Senate hopeful Kweisi Mfume spent more money than he raised during the second quarter of this year...The relatively small sum for Mfume surprised political analysts, who had expected the former NAACP president's contributions to align more closely with his strong showing in recent polls...

Mfume's campaign took in $135,000, significantly less than the $202,000 it raised in the year's first quarter. Cardin collected $925,000, falling just short of his first quarter total...

Clack, the Mfume spokesman, said he was unsure whether the campaign would be able to advertise in the Washington and Baltimore suburbs. Those areas are considered pivotal in the November general election, said Trevor Parry-Giles, an associate professor at the University of Maryland.

"That kind of money doesn't get you much at all," Parry-Giles, who has served as a creative consultant on hundreds of campaigns, said of Mfume's treasury. "He can maybe buy some TV time in Salisbury, but that's not where he should be trolling for votes."

Mfume can't compete with Steele in November, not with those numbers.  Hell, there's third-tier House challengers that raised more than that.  If Mfume wins the primary, this seat may be our toughest hold.

In the past few months, Cardin has regularly outpolled Steele by double digits.  Mfume has only recently began to narrowly lead Steele in the polls.  But with the huge monetary disadvantage, he won't be able to respond to Steele's attacks.  Unless Mfume starts bringing in the bucks now, his candidacy is over.

UPDATE: kindertotenlieder points out in the comments that Mfume raised $100,000 in just two days, not reflected in his 2nd quarter totals.