The debtor class - longterm presidential campaign debts

Buried in the files at the Federal Election Commission (FEC) is a quiet warning to firms and individuals who do business with presidential campaigns: Ask for payment in advance.

Big debts and angry creditors are the legacy of many a failed campaign. Hotels, printers, messenger services, rental car companies and the like are still owed hundreds of thousands of dollars by 1988 presidential campaigns, according to FEC files.

Former Secretary of State Alexander Haig's campaign committee reported more than $300,000 in debt as of March 31, including an unpaid $50,000 loan from Haig himself. The campaign committee for a Republican rival, evangelist Pat Robertson, owed $362,211 as of last March. The committee that launched the race of Democrat Bruce Babbitt, the former governor of Arizona, owed $130,000 as of July 1990.

Some ex-candidates are in a better position than others to pay their creditors. Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri, an influential Democrat, managed to raise more than $1 million to help pay off the debt from his failed presidential bid. After winning reelection to the Senate last November, Paul Simon (D-Ill.) contributed $65,000 in excess funds from his Senate war chest to pay off debts from his 1988 presidential campaign.

Others aren't so lucky. John Connally, the former Texas governor and Nixon treasury secretary, still owes more than $841,000 from his 1980 campaign for the Republican nomination.

A candidate can't invest more than $50,000 of his own money to retire a debt. Thus the 1984 presidential campaign of Ohio Sen. John Glenn (D), a millionaire, still owes nearly $2.3 million. A Cleveland bus company sued the Glenn campaign for $89,160 this spring, but a Glenn aide says it will have to wait in line behind the campaign's other creditors -- including four Ohio banks that together are owed almost $1.2 million.

COPYRIGHT 1991 Common Cause Magazine
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