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ELECTIONS
Mitt Romney

Romney departure sets off scramble for GOP donors

Fredreka Schouten
USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — Mitt Romney's decision to sit out the 2016 presidential race Friday set off a behind-the-scenes scramble by the supporters of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former Florida governor Jeb Bush to lock up the Republican Party's top donors.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former Florida governor Jeb Bush.

Several GOP fundraisers quickly committed to Bush, the son and brother of former presidents who is determined to raise hundreds of millions of dollars in a few short months to ward off competitors.

Bill Kunkler, a top executive at a private-equity firm in Chicago who raised money for Romney's 2012 campaign, said he had hoped the former Massachusetts governor would run again but now will shift his allegiance to Bush, who will be in Chicago next month for a fundraiser.

"It's bittersweet," he said. "Mitt Romney is an all-star. He's a real patriot." But of the remaining candidates, he said, only Bush has the "gravitas" to be president.

"He understands what it's like to do business at a high level," Kunkler said. "The others are politicians."

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David Beightol, a top Romney fundraiser among Washington lobbyists in 2012, also declared he would back Bush within an hour of Romney's announcement to donors that he would sit out the race.

Bush "is starting on third base because of what he's accomplished as governor, what he's accomplished in business and the fundraising network he has," he said.

"Jeb Bush is the kind of guy who can sit down with George Shultz and pick his brain about what's going on in Russia," Beightol added, referring to President Reagan's secretary of state. "No one else has that kind of advantage."

Romney's departure "is the best possible news for the Bush camp so far," said Brian Ballard, a Florida lobbyist backing Bush. "It makes him the leader of the pack for the nomination."

Bush, out of office since early 2007, and his allies have launched a leadership PAC and a super PAC — both dubbed Right to Rise — to collect money as he works to quickly assemble the machinery of a potential presidential campaign. Some 60 fundraisers already have been planned. He is offering donors the opportunity to join his "national executive committee" if they raise $500,000 each by March 31, according to a pledge form recently obtained by The Wall Street Journal.

All the candidates are fighting for an early fundraising advantage in a presidential race that will cost billions and is shaping up as most wide-open GOP nomination fight in recent history.

"I'm excited about the field," said Frank VanderSloot, an Idaho businessman who raised money for Romney and had hoped he would make a third bid.

"We have for the first time that I can remember a really strong set of cerebral candidates in the GOP," he said. "I think that will resonate really well" with voters.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker recently have reached out to VanderSloot's aides for support. He counts both men and Bush among his top three picks.

Christie, who is a formidable fundraiser in his own right, also has worked for weeks to lock up supporters. Ray Washburne, a Texas investor and the former finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, is leading Christie's fundraising effort.

With Romney's announcement, several top GOP donors were free to openly back the New Jersey governor, known for his brash, in-your-face style with constituents and journalists alike. Bobbie Kilberg — an executive in Northern Virginia who with her husband, lawyer Bill Kilberg raised millions for Romney's campaigns — said Friday that the couple now would turn its focus to boosting Christie's chances.

"I think, as Mitt said, it's time for the next generation," she said. "Chris is that next generation of leaders. He has the strength and that take-it-to-you approach to governing and campaigning that is necessary to win the presidency from the Democrats."

For donors who haven't made a decision, she said, "they are going to be approached by everyone."

Former Mississippi governor Haley Barbour, who is an influential former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said it's way too early to declare a GOP front-runner.

"It's still a very large field with many candidates who have strong records of achievement and a starting place," he said. Barbour said he won't make a decision "for months and months."

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