Is Tracey Mann Trying to Buy A Congressional Seat?

We’ve known for a long time now that liberal Republican Jim Barnett is a self-funder. Barnett has given himself at least $100,000 to fund his Congressional campaign, and that amount represents over a quarter of his remaining cash on hand as of the end of the 1^st Quarter.

But now there is reason to believe that Barnett isn’t alone in his efforts to purchase a Congressional seat. It now seems very likely that Mann is self-funding as well, although we won’t be able to know for sure until the next FEC report comes out next month.

This can’t be good news for conservatives, since Mann has a history of helping fund liberal Democrats like Jim Slattery

Mann ended the 1^st Quarter with just over $261,000 cash on hand, which was good enough for third place, behind Tim Huelskamp and Jim Barnett. But since then, Mann has gone on a spending spree, including a half a dozen high-priced mailers, some of which are several pages long. Mann has also gone up with a massive TV buy in an effort to convince voters that he’s a conservative farm kid with “Deep Roots in Kansas, Not Politics” (you know, not the kind of guy that would give money to support Jim Slattery).

Also, as of his last report, Mann has yet to pay for the 100s of road signs that are popping up in certain portions the Big First. Plus, almost 15% of Mann’s contributions are general-election only.

A basic breakdown of Mann’s spending would show that at this pace, he will be out of money well before the election – unless of course, he self-funds.

Friends in the Salina area tell me that Mann is personally wealthy and could probably self-fund his campaign at least as much as Barnett if he wanted to.

So now it’s safe to say that we have two self-funders in the race – one that’s never seen a tax increase he doesn’t like and another that just helps fund the campaign coffers of liberal Democrats like Jim Slattery.