No estimates available yet on the haul, but Bill Clinton’s appearance at a $250-a-head fund-raiser Saturday night at the Little Rock Marriott for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mike Ross certainly produced a decent payday. Clinton naturally gave Ross a warm endorsement — as a bipartisan-type (unlike all the Republicans running for office these days) and Ross took a crack at the GOP tactic of making the race about Nancy Pelosi.
Good quotes follow — here’s extensive coverage from Talk Business:
* CLINTON COMPARING ROSS TO LIKELY GOP CHALLENGER ASA HUTCHINSON: “You actually have a long record for both of them. And only one of them has consistently, even in the heated partisanship of Washington D.C., proven that he would get up every single day and try to find a way to get the show on the road by bringing people together across party lines – and that’s Mike Ross,”
* ROSS ON REPUBLICAN STRATEGY TO BRAND HIM AS LIBERAL TIED TO PRESIDENT OBAMA DEMOCRATIC LEADER NANCY PELOSI: “What do they have to do with state government in Arkansas?” Ross said. “I think Asa’s spent too much time living and lobbying and even being a registered voter in Washington, D.C. This is not about Washington. This is about us.”
Hutchinson’s all-purpose response to the criticism: Obamacare, Obamacare, Obamacare.
Someday, Asa Hutchinson is going to have to man up and square how he decries Obamacare as the driving evil of U.S. and state government with the fact that a gang of the most influential Republicans in Arkansas politics led adoption of the critical Medicaid expansion piece of Obamacare in Arkansas. He’ll also have to explain how he’d run Arkansas as governor if he is truly successful in repealing Obamacare and cutting off hundreds of millions in support flowing to Arkansas.
UPDATE: A Ross spokesman said the event drew a capacity crowd of 550 more than 500. At the base price, but many more paid additional amounts for sponsorship and private reception, the event raised $125,000 minimum.