Democrats Look To Raise Money For Health Care

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) is trying to rally its support base against GOP attacks on health care reform, asking supporters to donate to a new Emergency Health Care Rapid Response Fund. The DCCC set a goal today, in an email fundraising pitch, of $250,000 by midnight on July 31--the last day before August recess officially starts the following Monday, August 3. The money will be used to respond to GOP attacks on health reform, according to a source--presumably with web videos and the like. The DCCC is asking for contributions of $5 and $10.


Though the DCCC's role is to win races for the party, and it's the Democratic National Committee that takes the lead on legislative fights, the DCCC has a huge interest in the success of President Obama's initiative: as Marc noted earlier, without a victory on health care, Democrats won't have anything to run on in 2010. (Well, they may have cap and trade.) Moderate Democrats are now seen as holding up the reform push, but it's the outright opposition from Republicans "and their fat-cat CEO friends," as the fundraising email put it, that the DCCC will seek out and respond to.

FirstRead's Mark Murray this morning wondered if Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) hadn't helped Obama when he encouraging conservatives to block health care and "break him"; it gave the White House an enemy, allowing them to polarize the nation (which trusts them more than the GOP on health care) in their favor. The fight took on a more partisan tone yesterday when Obama responded to DeMint by saying "this isn't about me"; it's that partisan fight the DCCC is gearing up for.