Huckabee’s Review of Huck PAC 2009

Governor Huckabee’s email to supporters:

Just after Saxby Chambliss’ special election win in Georgia last December, I sat down with Sarah and our small team and laid out three broad goals for Huck PAC in 2009.

The first was to think differently about what a PAC could and couldn’t do. For Saxby we had launched a phone bank that generated almost 5,000 voter contact calls to Republican voters. It was a contribution towards his re-election that didn’t quite fit in the context of what PACs traditionally do, but felt right and was something I wanted to see continue.

The first goal grew out of those calls: build an organization that was capable of delivering that same level of grassroots support nationally as well as locally to Huck PAC endorsed candidates. Our goal was to identify 10,000 volunteers by the end of the year. To date we have identified 5,614 Team Huck volunteers. This growing team has represented Huck PAC at 30 state and local GOP conventions, hosted house parties across the country and is busy preparing for a new round of house parties in August in support of Bob McDonnell. This team of volunteers is in all 50 states and we have recruited Grassroots leadership in 47 states.

Our second goal was financial. In 2008, during a presidential election year, Huck PAC raised almost $1,000,000. So based on these results and given the economy, we set a financial target of raising $750,000 this year and significantly more next year. After six months we raised just over $300,000. Since then we’ve caught up and are on pace to reach our $750,000 goal.

The third goal was to identify 50 candidates nationally this year that Huck PAC would endorse. To date, we have identified and endorsed 17 candidates and have another dozen we are reviewing. I also set a goal of traveling to as many of our endorsed candidates events and fundraisers as possible through Huck PAC. To that end, I’ve keynoted fundraisers across the nation including one &nbs p;for Bob Vander Plaats in Iowa that raised $100,000 and four different events in Virginia for Bob McDonnell that raised a total of $250,000. Huck PAC has also contributed to almost all of the candidates we’ve endorsed.

So how are we doing so far? Well by the goals I personally set for our efforts, we are largely on track. Are we satisfied and complacent? Absolutely not, we are always working to do better and we will. We’ve got some new ideas up our sleeves so please stay tuned and if you are not involved as much as you would like, now is a good time to join our team.

With gratitude,

Mike Huckabee

Also, it appears that Huck PAC candidate Les Phillips is pleased with the event that Huckabee spoke at.  It seems that this event generated a lot of buzz in the blogosphere insinuating that the Governor got paid for his endorsement.  According to Les Phillips, straight from the horse’s mouth, that was not the case.