Progress Illinois

GOP congressional candidate Marty Ozinga had loaned $320,000 of his own money to his 11th District campaign by the end of the third quarter. Campaign finance reports show that, in the month since, he has given an additional $250,000 to the effort, bringing his total personal contribution to $570,000 this election year. This amount flies in the face of Ozinga's statement in September that he wouldn't be "writing big checks for my own campaign. I just don't believe in that."

It also begs the queston: if the Supreme Court had not struck down the Millionaire's Amendment earlier this year, would Democrat Debbie Halvorson now be able to raise some last-minute funds from her maxed-out donors?

First some background.

After Tim Baldermann bowed out of the race shortly after winning the GOP primary, many surmised that the county chairmen in charge of choosing a replacement would pick the wealthy Ozinga due to his ability to self-fund. But once tapped as the Republican candidate, Ozinga tamped down those expectations, telling the Tribune on May 1 that he would not spend more than $350,000.

At the time, crossing that $350,000 threshold triggered the Millionaire's Amendment, which -- depending on certain conditions -- could have potentially tripled (from $2,300 to $6,900) the maximum individual contribution to his opponents. In June, however, t he Supreme Court struck down that particular law. When Tribune reporter David Mendell asked whether the ruling changed Ozinga's gameplan, campaign manager Andy Sere didn't necessarilly rule out exceeding the $350,000 mark. "He's not planning to spend a ton of money out of his pocket," Sere said. "[H]e has not made a decision on how much exactly he is going to spend."

Then, appearing before the Tribune editorial board this fall, Ozinga declared: "I won't be writing big checks for my own campaign. I just don't believe in that." Watch it:

As of September 29 -- the date of the editorial board meeting -- Ozinga had only loaned his campaign $220,000.* During the following month, he handed over an additional $250,000. In a press release yesterday, the Halvorson campaign asked this apt question: "If that's not a 'big check' to millionaire Marty Ozinga ... what is?" The campaign also pointed out that Ozinga had said "I still feel middle class" during that same Tribune meeting.

So would Ozinga's personal loans have triggered the Millionaire's Amendment, allowing donors to triple their maximum contributions to Halvorson? Yes. But the threshold in this case would have been $554,000 -- not $350,000. This is because the formula for the now-defunct amendment takes into account any disparity in fundraising early in the election year.  Halvorson had raised $408,000 by January 31 and Ozinga nothing (he wouldn't become a candidate until months later), so the $350,000 threshold would have been raised by half that amount -- to $554,000.

Would the increased contirbution limits have made a difference in the final week of the campaign? Perhaps. As of October 15, the two campaigns were pretty evenly matched in terms of cash-on-hand (Ozinga with $206,000, Halvorson with $237,000). She could have made an instant appeal to her maxed-out donors and maybe covered some additional advertising before Election Day. 

Would that have really been necessary at this point?  With recent polls showing Halvorson ahead by double digits, probably not.  But we'll find out for sure on Election Day.

*CORRECTION: This post originally stated that, as of September 29, Ozinga had loaned his campaign only $70,000.  In fact, at that time he had loaned himself $220,000.