What Money Can Buy in Florida

CORE MESSAGE

This is what an election bought and paid for by the 1% looks like.

Connect: Election outcomes shouldn't depend on who has the biggest corporate donors.

Define: But the Florida primary just goes to show that the wealthiest of the wealthiest 1% -- hedge fund managers, Wall Street CEOs, and corporations -- can swing an election their way.

Illustrate: In South Carolina, Mitt Romney spent twice as much as Gingrich but still lost. In Florida, he couldn't pull it off until he brought in millions in secret corporate cash and spent five times more.

Expose: Is it any surprise that the corporate special interests that benefit most from a rigged system would go for the politician who'll keep it that way? That's a sale, not democracy.

Explain: Corporations and hedge fund managers don't spend millions of dollars on candidates unless they expect a return on their investment. And they know Romney will pay back big time.

Tweet: If corporations really were people and could vote, Romney's their guy. 

ATTACKS AND RESPONSES

"Citizens United was correctly decided -- there should be no limits on campaign contributions."

• Thanks to Citizens United, big corporations already get to spend unlimited amounts of money -- in secret and without accountability -- so politicians answer to them instead of voters.
• It's no surprise Romney would say this -- he's already raking in millions from hedge fund managers, Wall Street, and corporations.
• If corporations really were people and could vote, too, Romney would be fine.

"The American people want a president who can turn things around -- I understand how that works."

• Our economy works best when everyone gets a fair shot, everyone plays by the same rules, and everyone pays their fair share.
• Here's what Romney understands: how to raise working parents' taxes so he can pay less and how to let Wall Street get away with abusing the rules.
• We can keep our economy going, but we need leaders who want to fight for all of us -- not just big corporations and the wealthiest 1%.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

• Mitt Romney's super PAC raked in $30 million from just 200 donors -- the wealthiest of the wealthiest few -- during the second half of 2011 alone. In fact, hedge fund managers are the top four donors to his super PAC.
• Romney's campaign and super PAC alone spent $15 million on TV ads in the Florida primary: 13,000 of them versus only about 200 pro-Gingrich ads by Gingrich's super PAC. Over 90% of the campaign ads in Florida were negative, meaning Romney's ads were almost all attack ads.
• In comparison, then-GOP presidential candidate John McCain spent only $11 million on ads during his entire 2008 primary campaign.
• Of the Florida voters who said campaign ads were an important factor in their vote, 60% voted for Mitt Romney.
• As in all previous primary elections so far, Mitt Romney cleaned up with the richest Florida voters but struggled with regular voters. National polling shows people just don't like him much, either.
• In the South Carolina primary, Mitt Romney and his outside backers spent twice as much as the winner but still lost by double-digit margins.
• Classic Mitt Romney quotesinclude --
  • "I'm not concerned with the very poor."
  • "Banks aren't bad people."
  • "Corporations are people."
  • "I like being able to fire people who provide services to me."
  • "I'm also unemployed."
  • "There were a couple of times I wondered whether I was going to get a pink slip."
  • $374,000 is "not very much."
  • "I'll tell you what, ten-thousand bucks? $10,000 bet?"
  • "I'm not looking to put money in people's pockets."
  • "...don't try and stop the foreclosure process. Let it run its course and hit the bottom."

We develop messaging by aggregating, analyzing and distilling polling, tested messaging, and expert recommendations, and monitoring the media to identify what is and isn't working. See here for some of the experts and organizations we draw on.