Karl-Thomas Returns to Texas- The 2,000 Mile Challenge

by: Karl-Thomas Musselman

Tue Oct 30, 2007 at 08:24 AM CST

Answering the call to serve.

The rumors are true- I'm moving back to Texas!

I am excited to announce that I have taken leave from ActBlue in order to join Rick Noriega's US Senate campaign as the Online Coordinator effective November 1.

Currently, I'm writing you from the Boston-Logan Airport where I will soon board a jetBlue flight to Austin (via JFK in New York) with my cat (Catfish). As you can see, she's handling it quite well. She wasn't much help with the $50 cab fare to get here (taxis are crazy expensive in Boston) but she seems just as eager as I to return to warmer Texas weather. And of course, to Rick Noriega's Senate campaign.

But Catfish and I would like to issue a fundraising challenge in support of Rick Noriega.

It's roughly 2,000 miles from Boston and Austin.

We'll be flying for about 6.5 hours, arriving in Texas at 5 pm.

Can you raise $1 for Rick Noriega for each mile of flight by the time we land?

$208 for Noriega gets us to New York.
$570 for Noriega gets us to Virginia.
$1,100 for Noriega gets us to Georgia.
$1,415 for Noriega gets us to Mississippi.
$2,000 for Noriega gets us home to Texas!

Give here: http://www.actblue.com/page/2000milechallenge

That's $2,000 by 5pm, just $300 an hour- and I'm even give you a head start! I won't be able to check in on the progress of this effort until we land in the Lone Star state so I'm putting my faith in you to support our presumptive Democratic nominee to defeat John Cornyn. I wouldn't be returning to Texas if I didn't think Rick Noriega represented a once in a decade opportunity to change Texas politics.

It's time to retire Junior Senator John Cornyn.
And you can do it for just $1 a mile.

Our eyes are upon you Texas. Will you, too, answer the call?

Noriega Beats Watts in Contributions

This from the El Paso Times

Although the actual campaign accounts vary by several million dollars (Watts self-contributed $7.5M so far to his campaign), it seems that Noriega has garnered more support in individual contributions than Watts.

Noriega: $508,000
Watts: $443,000

$570,000: Rick Noriega Raises As Much As Casey, Brown, and Webb in COMBINED In The Same Period, 2006

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT:

Monday, October 1^st, 2007 James Aldrete, 512-751-3448

Noriega Exploratory Campaign to report $570,000

Lt. Col. who served a tour of duty in Afghanistan exceeds benchmark

set by 4 out of 5 of the 2006 winning Democratic Senate challengers in his first federal financial disclosure report

(Houston, TX) — Rick Noriega announced today contributions of $570,000 for the October 15^th FEC financial disclosure report. The report, the first for the State Representative and Lt. Colonel’s exploratory campaign, shows growing momentum for his campaign to unseat incumbent Republican John Cornyn.

“Rick Noriega’s strength is his story,” noted his campaign manager Sue Schechter, referring to his long history of service, including a tour of duty in Afghanistan, playing a leading role in the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts in Houston, commanding troops and serving five terms as a State Representative. “As our very first FEC report makes clear, Rick has the fundraising appeal and a growing network of supporters to ensure we’ll have the resources to communicate his story to the voters.”

Noriega’s fundraising totals put Texas on the map nationally, besting the benchmarks set by 4 out of 5 of the winning Democratic challengers in 2006 Senate races. As the attached chart shows, Noriega’s totals put him ahead of the 2006-October 15^th filings of John Tester (D-MT), Bob Casey (D-PA), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and Jim Webb (D-VA), whose victories last cycle helped secure Democratic control of the US Senate. Noriega’s totals are ahead of all winners except Claire McCaskill (D-MO) who was waging her third statewide race and received much of her support from national donors.

In addition to Noriega’s support from a growing list of the state’s leading Democratic donors, the campaign also raised $158,860 online from over 1,100 donations via ActBlue, the Democratic clearinghouse for online donations. That made the Noriega campaign the most successful non-incumbent Senate candidate on ActBlue during the 3rd quarter. The report also includes a $5,000 contribution from VoteVets.org PAC, the leading political organization of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, as well as a $50,000 loan Noriega made to his own campaign, and nearly 1,300 unique contributors.

“Our fundraising network includes pro-choice women from Dallas, business leaders from the Valley, Democratic icons from across the state, and small dollar donors from a retired woman in Wichita Falls to over 1,100 contributors on the Internet,” Schechter explained.

“We accomplished this milestone in the toughest fundraising quarter, after Col. Noriega served in a grueling legislative session, and lost two weeks of fundraising while he fulfilled his guard duty at Fort Benning, GA,” added Schechter. “We continue to run a lean operation, because we know we’re in this for the long haul,” Schechter continued, referring to aggressive efforts to minimize overhead expenditures. “But one thing is for sure, despite our primary opponent’s efforts to portray himself as the next Daddy Warbucks, more and more Texans are showing they prefer to invest in experience, not just a checkbook.”

Additional details on Rick Noriega’s report will follow mid-week along with a digital copy of the official disclosure.

You're Invited! Rick Noriega Reception in San Antonio

Please Join

Eddie Alderete
Hon. Joe Bernal
Gina Castenaeda
Hon. Joaquin Castro
Hon. Henry Cisneros
Hon. Mary Alice Cisneros
Hon. Trey Martinez Fischer
Hon. Pete Gallego
Dr. Cha Guzman
Andy Hernandez
Hon. Charlie Urbina Jones
Ernest J. Martinez
Gerardo Menchaca
Henry R. Munoz III
Gilberto Ocañas
Hon. Justin Rodriguez
Hon. Sylvia Romo
Hon. Elliot Shapleigh
Hon. Mike Villarreal
Hon. Leticia Van De Putte

For a reception in support of
State Rep. &

Army Lt. Col. Rick Noriega
and his exploratory campaign for US Senate

Friday, September 28th
Noon-1:30 p.m.

La Margarita Restaurant
120 Produce Row
San Antonio Texas

$2,300 ~ Patron
$1000 ~ Host
$500 ~ Sponsor
$250 ~ Friend

Please make checks payable to “Rick Noriega for Senate”

For more information or to RSVP,

please contact Cathy Rivera at 713-337-0068 or email rsvp@landslidevictories.net

(h/t Walker Report)

Rick Noriega... Worth $72,012!

That's right! 800 donors think that Rick Noriega in the Texas Senate Seat in DC is worth $72,012. I think it's worth more! Rick stands for real change, experience, and leadership. Can we hit 900 by the end of the week? Click to donate along the right -->

Introducing: Rick Noriega, Frontrunner.

Thats right. Rick leads the a new IVR poll in general, but also in every demographic subset of gender and ethnicity (note: before Reichstadt's withdrawal). Over half polled are undecided, but of those with an opinion, Noriega takes 58% (Watts 30%, Richstadt 12%). (graphic from Burnt Orange Report). This from IVR:

Noriega was the clear leader among those who had a preference, with 27% to Watts' 14% and Reichstadt's 6%. The Houston area was strong for Noriega with about 50% of the vote despite 38% undecided. The Corpus Christi area had similar numbers, but with Watts in the lead. San Antonio and DFW were about 2/3 undecided, with Watts and Noriega about even. Austin was also 2/3 undecided, but with a 7-1 lead for Noriega. El Paso was close to the state average, while the LRGV gave Noriega a 40% to 23% lead with 34% undecided.

Excluding undecided and breaking the results into subsets by combination of gender and ethnicity, and then comparing Noriega's percentage to Watts' percentage, Noriega led in every category. His strongest showing was among Latino women, who gave him 2.9 'votes' for every one of Watts'. The closest subset was white women, who gave Noriega 1.2 times as many 'votes.' This was also the subset with the highest undecided - 58%. The lowest undecided was among Latino men, with 39%, who gave Noriega his second smallest lead with 1.6x. Many of these slices contain very small samples, so take them with a grain of salt.

8/29-30, 489 polled, 4.5% MoE

Combine that with ActBlue's Activity Report for August:

August is over so it's time for a monthly stats round-up of what's been happening in Democratic online fundraising over ActBlue. Let's dive into some data- (change from prior month in parentheses).

Total Amount Contributed: $1,039,376.72 (+$396,938)
Total # of Contributions: 14,648 (+5,004)
Average Contribution Size: $70.96 (+$4.35)

Total # of Recipient Campaigns & Committees: 419 (+ 67)

Here are the Top 10 Recipients by amounts received through ActBlue in August.

	Name	Amount	Office
	John Edwards	$214,180.51	President
	Darcy Burner	$105,202.18	WA-08
	Niki Tsongas	$48,616.00	MA-05
	Rick Noriega	$39,696.13	TX-Sen
	Jamie Eldridge	$30,122.35	MA-05
	Jeff Merkley	$27,581.67	OR-Sen
	Jared Polis	$25,153.00	CO-02
	Russ Warner	$21,118.87	CA-26
	San Diego Democratic Party	$18,119.00	County
	Joe Alioto Veronese	$16,505.00	CA-SD-03

Here are the Top 10 Recipients by # of donors through ActBlue in August.

Name	Donors	Office
John Edwards	3,182	President
Darcy Burner	2,950	WA-08
Rick Noriega	539	TX-Sen
Daniel Biss	358	IL-HD-17
Dennis Kucinich	274	President
Jamie Eldridge	270	MA-05
San Diego Democratic Party	251	County
Jeff Merkley	245	OR-Sen
Al Franken	241	MN-Sen
BlogPAC	216	PAC

And here are the Top 5 fundraising pages by number of donors (excluding pages used by candidates solely to collect contributions directly from campaign websites).

	Fundraising Page	Raised	Donors	Avg.
	Burn Bush for Burner	$87,682.54	2429	$36.09
	Blue America '08	$24,525.30	372	$20.00
	Blue Majority	$16,265.42	349	$23.07
	Netroots for Rick Noriega for Senate	$30,849.16	324	$95.21
	Brotherhood 2.0 for Daniel Biss	$1,673.00	210	$7.96

So, There you have it. Rick is scoring in the top four spots in each category. Check out the average donation amount at the Netroots for Rick page: $95.21. That's nearly three times larger than any other average on that top list. Rick's making appearances, sharing his story, and working to make a change. I'm happy to introduce: Rick Noriega, Frontrunner.

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE HAW!!!!!!!! $26,960

We asked, and you delivered. In less than 36 hours, we raised over $5,000 for change in Washington. $4,000 was raised in the last 10 hours alone. You guys are simply amazing.

From the Campaign:

The support our campaign has received during the past two weeks has been amazing. I can't wait to see Rick tomorrow and tell him that we shattered not one, but two fundraising goals in just eleven days!

Now let's get Rick in office!

$20K Goal Reached... SHOOT FOR $25K!

It's amazing that ActBlue considers Texas an active state, but that's what you get when your explatory committee brings in a third as much as a Presidential Candidate! (12K Rick, $37k Edwards).

Let's keep this momentum going, and bring in that $5K before Rick gets back from training and show him what kind of support he has from all of us.

CONTRIBUTE NOW