After 17 months of directing Operation Hillary, the would-be
commander-in-chief is confronting some serious debt. $22.5 million of it. According to a report by the Federal Election Commission (FEC) released Friday, Clinton owes $10.3
million to everyone from printers in Iowa to
caterers in Pennsylvania
to Mark Penn's consulting firm in D.C. She's also down the $12.2 million she
personally loaned her campaign.
As Clinton
heads into a meeting
today with Obama--at which her finances are assumed to be a topic of
conversation--we decided to give her a hand and map out three options she has
for settling her debt:
Clinton
is not the only candidate this year to run into the red. Rudy Giuliani's website is actively
soliciting donations to retire his campaign's still-stinging primary debts, and
Giuliani teamed with McCain in a version of Debtventure No. 3 when, earlier
this year, the McCain campaign promised to help Giuliani retire his debt
(though these efforts have been a bit neglected,
as McCain has had his mind on other things). In an infamous variation on
Debtventure No. 2, beloved spaceman-cum-senator John
Glenn retained a nearly $3 million debt from his 1984 presidential run
until just two years ago, when the FEC let
it slide. But since that option would prevent Clinton from running for future
office, it's unlikely she
will go that route.
Clinton's
likely course of action may be a combination of Debtventures Nos. 1 and 3:
Convince her donors to reclassify their loans for her Senate campaign so that
she can collect funds from her own supporters, while also gathering
contributions from Obama donors. She has already sent a video
to supporters asking for their continued backing. And if today's meeting goes
well, she may also have Obama's support (as indicated in a Tuesday phone
call during which he asked his top donors to help Clinton retire her debt).
Happily, however financially dire things may seem for "Hillary Clinton: The Campaign," "Hillary Clinton: The Multimillion-Dollar Joint Bank Account"
should more than cushion the blow in approximately 6.8 speaking engagements.
--Nicole Allan and Bess Kalb