This article is more than 1 year old

eBay Meg still chasing California's top job

Will largest ever campaign spending be enough?

Ex-eBay boss Meg Whitman only has a paltry $9m left in the pot for spending on her campaign to become Governor of California.

Whitman raised a record-breaking $140m for her campaign. But $119m of Meg Whitman's campaign fund came from one donor - Meg Whitman. This breaks the previous self-funding record held by Michael Bloomberg who spent $110m to secure the mayor's job in New York.

But despite collecting massive donations from herself, Whitman has only $9.1m left in her campaign chest. Her rival for the job - Democrat Jerry Brown - has $23m to spend in the last month of campaigning. Voters go to the polls on 2 November.

Despite the unpopularity of Republican incumbent Arnold Schwarzenegger, polls put Whitman and Brown neck-and-neck as they enter the final few weeks of electioneering.

Meg does have some friends. We also note two contributions of $25,900 - one from a chairman called Scott McNealy and the other from homemaker Susan McNealy. Any connection to Sun Microsystems?

Other contributors include Thomas Siebel, who handed over $25,900, he must still be angry about those elephants.

Marc Benioff of Salesforce.com also handed over $10,000. (Benioff was an early supporter of Schwarzenegger's run for California back in 2003 - and look how well that's turned out.)

The full list of contributors is available from this page.

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like