On Friday, Bloomberg News reported another embarrassing fact about the recently completed Democratic National Convention: it operated at a $15 million deficit.
In a move certain to raise eyebrows at the Federal Election Commission, $10 million of that deficit was covered by a temporary line of credit from Duke Energy Corporation. Even with that borrowed $10 million, the DNC still owes vendors $5 million, and it doesn’t have the cash to pay them:
Democrats ended their convention in Charlotte $5 million short of their budget even after being forced to draw down a $10 million line of credit from Duke Energy Corp. (DUK), according to a Democratic Party fundraiser.
That will leave a $15 million bill that eventually will have to be paid by President Barack Obama’s campaign or the Democratic National Committee, according to the fundraiser, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
The Charlotte Host Committee ended the convention with more than $5 million in immediate obligations and may require a direct cash infusion from the Obama campaign to pay vendors, said the fundraiser.
The $10 million line of credit to Duke Energy will need to be repaid next year, said a second person familiar with the matter, who also spoke on condition of anonymity. Duke Energy Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jim Rogers is co-chairman of the host committee.
Those debts could siphon off advertising money in the campaign’s final months, as Democrats face a cash disadvantage.
The convention’s red ink ads to a litany of misfires that characterized last week’s debacle in Charlotte.
On Wednesday, the delegates shouted down returning God to the party platform three times before they were over-ruled undemocratically by convention chairman and Los Angeles Mayor Anthony Villaraigosa.
On Thursday, President Obama was forced to move his acceptance speech from the 75,000 open air Bank of America Stadium to the 20,000 indoor Time Warner Cable Arena.
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