Mitt Romney Hosts Last Fundraiser, Turns Focus To Swing States And President Obama

GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has attended his last formal fund-raising event of the 2012 election cycle. The Republican candidate for President will now turn his attention towards his final debate with President Obama. Romney is also expected to heavily attack the swing states that will ultimately determine his future. The final debate will focus on foreign policy and will take place on October 22 at 9:00-10:30 pm Eastern Time.

Romney attended his final fundraising event on Saturday night. The GOP candidate has spent much of the last year traveling across the country in an attempt to raise money for his campaign. Mitt Romney even held fundraisers in London and Israel.

On several occasions, Romney has told reporters that he would rather be on the campaign trail than spending his time fundraising. However, with President Obama raising nearly $600 million, it became immediately apparent that Romney needed to hold his own in the political funding arena.

Romney told CNN:

“That’s a challenge with a president who blew through the federal spending limits. It means that campaigns now have to spend a disproportionate amount of time fund-raising. You appreciate all the help you get, but you wish you could spend more time on the campaign trail.”

Romney did, however, take full advantage of his last night fundraising, attending two separate events at the homes of his rich supporters, specifically Washington Redskins part owner Dwight Schar and the home of Wilbur Ross, a billionaire investor.

The GOP presidential nominee might prefer the campaign trail over fundraising because of various comments he made behind closed doors that were later made embarrassingly public. Among his now famous remarks were attack against the poor, specifically 47 percent of Americans. Here is a video of Romney responding to some of his fundraising comments:

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Just because Mitt Romney has stopped officially attending fundraising events, the GOP members campaign is quick to point out that supporters can continue to donate on his official campaign website, through the mail, and via text messages.

While Mitt Romney will be busily traveling across the country to lure in undecided voters, his vice presidential running mate Paul Ryan will attend more fundraising events later in the week.

As the Los Angeles Times reports, both campaigns saw a surge in September donations with “Obama and affiliated Democratic committees” bringing in $181 million and Romney and his affiliates capturing $170 million in new donations.

The Obama campaign, in the meantime, spent twice as much on its campaign in September as Romney’s campaign did during the same time period. That spending by the Obama camp allowed Romney to enter October with a cash on hand lead. Romney, at the start of October, was controling $191 million in campaign fundraising funds while President Obama still had a healthy $150 million cash on hand.

The AFP points to Colorado, Florida, Ohio and Virginia as the primary states that will now become the focal points for both Presidential contenders.

Putting an end to the campaign fundraising circuit is a drastic change for Romney and Obama. President Obama on his own has attended 220 fundraisers since announcing his re-election bid last year.

According to the Sunlight Foundation, the two men have raised more than $2 billion during the campaign season with Romney and his Republican supporters capturing $800 million of that fundraising.

While President Obama has raised more money from individual voters, his opponent has been able to partner with his super-rich supporters and their “Super PACs” to raise massive amounts of “bundled funds.” Among Romney’s supporters are the Karl Rove powerhouse known as Crossroads GPS. Money captured by Crossroads is mostly used to air President Obama attack ads.

President Obama this week announced that “bundlers” who helped raise at least $50,000 for his campaign have helped bring in a total of $180.1 million. Romney has not disclosed his bundlers at this time, but the number is suspected to be much higher.

Mitt Romney has not been without his individual donors. Bill Allison, editorial director at the nonpartisan Sunlight Foundation, tells the Chicago Tribune that Romney has been seeing greatly increased donations from evangelical conservatives who he notes “have become the forgotten group in the 2012 campaign.”

In the meantime, the Huffington Post believes the Presidential election will come down to just 106 counties located in the countries best known swing states. According to the publication, those counties will be located in the most fickle voting populations found around Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

With various Presidential polls showing Obama in the lead and others showing Romney with the advantage, the POTUS office is definitely up for grabs.

The most recently released NBC Poll shows a virtual 47 percent to 47 percent tie between Obama and Romney.

We can expected to see GOP hopeful Mitt Romney courting the women and hispanic vote in the coming weeks, two groups the GOP base has been largely unsuccessful courting because of their stance on immigration and women’s rights. Romney has attempted every approach to courting women possible with varied results.

As stressful as this campaign cycle has likely been on both President Obama and Governor Romney, they have found time to poke a bit of fun at one another. The most recent humorous attack came in the form of Obama’s “Romnesia” statements. Here’s the Obama speech in which he attacks his opponent in the weeks leading up to the election:

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Now is the time where voters will be able to not only come to a final decision about their candidate of choice; it is also the time where we will see how quickly either candidate will switch their view on a topic in order to be met with the largest consensus support they can possibly receive.

This is also the time where news publications on the left and right will throw their support behind their candidate; for example, Fox News is already reporting that Iran’s political members are hoping for a President Obama win.

Will you continue to offer funds to your candidate of choice now that they have stepped away from the fundraising circuit?