Candidates Are Slow to Identify ‘Bundlers’

[depakid]

Senators Barack Obama and John McCain have long been among the most outspoken critics of the influence of money in politics.

Yet records show that in their presidential campaigns, neither has lived up to his promise to fully disclose the identities of his top money collectors who bundle millions of dollars in campaign contributions.

Since November, Mr. Obama had added just two new names to a list of 326 fund-raisers who have bundled contributions of $50,000 or more for him, despite the campaign’s taking in more than $180 million during that time.

After receiving an inquiry from The New York Times, the campaign scrambled on Thursday evening to update its list of bundlers, adding 181 names, a jump of more than 50 percent, and increasing the amounts some were credited with raising. The number of bundlers who have collected $200,000 or more increased to 138 from 78.

Mr. Obama, in particular, has made transparency a cornerstone of his campaign, even introducing a bill in the Senate last year that would mandate that presidential candidates identify their bundlers. But Senator John McCain, the presumed Republican nominee, has also railed against the influence of money on politics and been lax on the issue of bundler disclosure as well.

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It is unclear how many bundlers might be missing from Mr. McCain’s list. He has enjoyed a surge in fund-raising in recent months, after struggling much of last year, and absorbed many former fund-raisers for Mitt Romney, Rudolph W. Giuliani and other Republican rivals who were not on his initial list.

Brian Rogers, a spokesman for Mr. McCain, said on Thursday that staff members were in the process of updating their bundler list. He said he believed it was “reasonable” to expect the campaign would add to it “every couple months.”

“It’ll be updated in the next week or so,” Mr. Rogers said. “This is something Senator McCain believes in. He’s committed to being open and transparent.”

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Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton early last year released a list of her “Hillraisers,” people who had raised $100,000 or more for her. But in November she also stopped updating her list, which had more than 320 names, according to watchdog groups, soon after one of her top bundlers, Norman Hsu, who had raised more than $800,000, was accused of fraud and questionable fund-raising tactics.

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/11/us/politics/11bundlers.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&adxnnlx=1215803162-lPoatYQn3SuEO3lqnj/yAA