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The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) officially retired its debt from the 2006 cycle this week, joining its GOP counterpart in going debt-free in its yet-to-be-filed March financial report.
The DCCC had about half of the National Republican Congressional Committee’s (NRCC) $18 million in debt at the beginning of the cycle. The NRCC retired the last of its debt last week.
While the Democrats paid their debt off at roughly the same time, at the end of February they had raised $20 million more and spent less money, even without factoring in debt payments. The NRCC spent $53.4 million to the DCCC’s $40.3 million, a gap wider than the roughly $9 million difference in debt.
The end result is a more than seven-to-one cash advantage for the DCCC, $38 million to $5.1 million. The DCCC chose to pay down its debt more slowly than it could have, preferring a larger cash-on-hand advantage to a debt-free committee.
At the end of March 2006, by contrast, the committees were virtually deadlocked. The DCCC had $23 million in cash and $1 million in debt, while the NRCC had $24.5 million and no debt.
From now on, both committees will be raising strictly for the general election and upcoming special elections.
“Thanks to our strong grassroots, online, and member support, we have been able to pay off all of our debt and remain aggressively on the offense,” DCCC spokesman Doug Thornell said.
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