If I were a Democratic donor, I'd want to know why CD 26 candidate Annette Taddeo -- the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's chosen one -- is allowed to bulldoze her way through cash when she's got a contested primary and a well-financed Republican incumbent ahead of her.
And is anybody looking at what she's spending her money on? For one thing, a payroll big enough to choke a horse. For another -- and this one is a curiosity -- a Republican consultant that most Dems wouldn't consider for a moment.
I've written before about Taddeo's woefully anemic quarterly fundraising report, filed in two batches, April 14 and April 15. In all, she raised $219,682 for the entire first quarter of 2016. That's $113,609 less than her primary opponent, Joe Garcia, had raised in the six or so weeks he had been in the race.
Think about it: In spite of Taddeo's almost daily begging email, Garcia raised 50 percent more than she did, and in less than half the time.
And, by the way, of that $219,682, Taddeo spent $181,984, leaving her $37,698 net for the quarter. Garcia, meanwhile, spent $19,290 on receipts of $333,291. That gives him $315,682 cash on hand.
What a dip: On Jan. 1, Taddeo had a cash advantage over Garcia of $463,298; after six weeks of campaigning, that advantage dwindled to $180,000.
I understand she's a talented fundraiser, and I believe that. But she's still no Lauren Book, a state Senate candidate running unopposed, whose campaign treasury is overflowing. Raising money for congressional races is generally a lot more difficult.
The point is, if current trends continue, Taddeo's campaign cupboard could be bare in a matter of weeks.
Don't take my word for it, look at the federal campaign finance report. The overwhelming majority of her spending has been on staff: $149,374 in the first quarter. That's a big number.
By all accounts, Taddeo has buffered herself with something like three finance assistants, a campaign manager, a political director, a field director, in fact a host of field staff -- and this doesn't count the consultants.
It’s a tough road ahead, because for Taddeo to get her spending back in line with her fundraising, she's going to have to lose staff -- never an easy thing for a campaign to do, even if the employees are technically only contract workers.
But that's not even the most questionable thing going on in Taddeo World. The report lists a series of payments, $6,500 in all, to Biaralex Communications. According to a recent corporate filing with the State of Florida, the owner of Miami-based Biaralex is Aida Antunez.
Aida Antunez is a Republican, as her voting record shows. And her clients are Republican.
Aida Antunez' husband Emiliano, too, used to be a Biaralex officer.
Now he is owner of a firm called Dark Horse Strategies, where Aida also worked as a telemarketer.
Emiliano, like his wife, is a Republican, and a former executive member of the Miami-Dade GOP. (Remember, Taddeo led the DEC in Miami-Dade County.) He was also a Ron Paul supporter.
His firm offers a variety of services, including phone banking and polling. I found this interesting because volunteers and supporters of Joe Garcia claim his campaign has been the object of "push poll" calls. (A push poll, says Wikipedia, "is a form of telemarketing-based propaganda and rumor mongering, masquerading as a poll ... (and) attempts to influence or alter the view of voters."
Jermaine House, south regional press secretary of the DCCC, said he had never heard of Biaralex, the Antunezes or Dark Horse Strategies.
Shaun Daniels, Taddeo's campaign manager, said emphatically the campaign has done no push polling and has no intention of doing so. Neither has it engaged in robo calls, though it could later on.
Why did the campaign hire a Republican consultant? "Emiliano Antunez was recommended to us by a very prominent Democrat," Daniels said. "He's helping us do petitions for the ballot right now and we're very happy with him."
There's no question that Bialarex is a red, not a blue firm -- at least in terms of the owner's stripes. Each year the DNC releases a set of voting scores based on analytics and other "big data." They rank a voter's likelihood of supporting a Democratic candidate on a scale of 1 to 100, with 90-100 being high support for Democrats and 0-10 being the very least likely to vote for Democrats. Aida and Emiliano Antunez's most recent scores were 4.6 and a 7.6 respectively -- bottom of the barrel from the Dems' point of view.
Nevertheless, Emiliano Antunez said Monday morning he definitely has other Democratic clients, but he wouldn't tell me who they are. "That's for me to know and you to find out," he said. "Don't ever call me again."
So, I repeat ... If I were a Democratic donor, pretty darn quick I would want Taddeo to explain 1) her defining finance strategy, and 2) her decision to hire a consultant who pledges allegiance to the other team. What was she thinking?
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
