SEARCH LATEST NEWS
Mitt Romney Home Privacy Archive
MITT ROMNEY
POSTED BY EIZ ON THURSDAY, 19 JANUARY, 2012, 7:14 AM
GO
Mitt-Romney.png
One of Mitt Romney's strongest assets as the GOP presidential front-runner is also a potentially
serious liability in the race: his heavy reliance on a small group of millionaires and billionaires for
financial support. A quarter of the money amassed ...
Share |
MITT ROMNEY
POSTED BYO EIZ N THURSDAY, 19 JANUARY, 2012, 7:14 AM
73 dead, 1,000 injured in Egypt soccer riot
“Soul Train” creator Don Cornelius dies
Surprising details from Facebook’s IPO
filings Baratunde Thurston on “How To Be
Black”
One of Mitt Romney’s strongest assets as
the GOP presidential front-runner is also a
potentially serious liability in the race: his
heavy reliance on a small group of
millionaires and billionaires for financial
support.
A quarter of the money amassed by Romney’s campaign and an allied super PAC has come from
just 41 people, each of whom has given more than $100,000, according to a Washington Post
analysis of disclosure data. Nearly a dozen of the donors have contributed $1 million or more.
The preponderance of mega-rich supporters poses a political challenge for Romney, who has
struggled for weeks over questions about his vast wealth, his history as a private equity manager
and a series of gaffes that seemed to highlight his privileged station. He stumbled again on
Wednesday when he told a CNN interviewer that he was “not concerned about the very poor,
because they have a safety net.”
Some of Romney’s biggest supporters include executives at Bain Capital, his former firm; bankers
at Goldman Sachs; and a hedge fund mogul who made billions betting on the housing crash.
These and other donor details follow the release last week of Romney’s tax returns, which showed
millions held in the Cayman Islands and other overseas havens and a tax rate that is far lower than
that paid by most American workers.
The revelations come at a time when President Obama and other Democrats are increasing their
focus on economic fairness issues ahead of the 2012 elections, including calls to increase tax
rates on millionaires and close tax loopholes on investment income. Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.)
said at a news conference Wednesday that hedge-fund managers are helping Romney because
he opposes higher tax rates for a type of investment income, known as “carried interest,” that
primarily benefits the wealthy.