Billionaires Alice Walton, George Soros and Marc Benioff are helping to finance a super-political action committee encouraging former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to run for president, according to a report filed yesterday with the Federal Election Commission.
Each gave $25,000 to Ready for Hillary PAC, organized a year ago to provide Clinton outside support if she chooses to seek the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination.
The super-PAC earlier reported raising about $4 million last year from 30,000 donors, most of them giving small amounts, such as $20.16. Walton, Soros and Benioff were among 33 people or companies that gave $25,000 in the second half of 2013, the FEC report shows. New Yorkers who chipped in to help their former senator include Roger Altman, the chairman and founder of New York-based Evercore Partners Inc.
The super-PAC can’t coordinate with Clinton if she becomes a candidate. It can, however, sell her campaign its data -- almost 2 million supporters have signed up for the group so far -- or mobilize voters and advertise for her on its own. The group, based in Arlington, Virginia, is limiting contributions to $25,000 even though it is permitted to accept donations in unlimited amounts.
Its early fundraising success, still more than two years before Election Day, could give Clinton a competitive advantage; there’s no comparable candidate-specific super-PAC for any of the prospective Republican candidates, who include Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.
Leading Polls
Clinton, 66, dominates other Democrats in voter preference polls and has said she’ll make a decision about a White House campaign sometime this year. A Jan. 30 Washington Post-ABC News poll found her with 73 percent of support from Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, a 6-to-1 lead over her rivals.
“I’ll think about it in the future sometime,” Clinton said Jan. 27 at the National Automobile Dealers Association convention in New Orleans.
Walton, the daughter of Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal- Mart Stores Inc. founder Sam Walton, is the world’s 13th-richest person with a fortune of $33.9 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Alice Walton’s donation underscores the Clintons’ longstanding ties to business leaders in Arkansas, where Bill Clinton was governor for 12 years prior to becoming president in 1993. The pro-Clinton group also received $25,000 from John Tyson, chairman of Springdale-based Tyson Foods Inc.