Chicago Story: Trump sends GOP donors spinning
CHICAGO (AP) — Ron Gidwitz, Dan Webb and William Kunkler are veteran Republicans — and friends — from Chicago's political money circuit.
Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner pretends Trump doesn't exist, Republican Sen. Mark Kirk trashes him, and the state's top GOP donors, mostly moderate business leaders, squirm at his racially charged comments.
While big crossover donors like Webb are rare so far, there's evidence that many Republicans are taking the Kunkler route of sitting on the sidelines, an Associated Press analysis of Federal Election Commission filings found.
Of the nearly 25,000 people who made the maximum contribution to GOP candidates other than Trump in the primary, about three dozen have since maxed out to Clinton.
[...] came the nominee's Memorial Day weekend assertion that a Mexican judge's heritage made him ineligible to handle a case involving Trump.
Webb started thinking — about Trump's remarks on the appearance of various women, the pronouncement that foreign Muslims should be temporarily barred from entering the country.
Could he explain to children why he supports the GOP nominee?
Webb shared his views with friend Lanny Davis, a longtime Clinton backer and Washington attorney, who put him in touch with J.B. Pritzker, one of the Democrat's top Chicago financiers.
In mid-June, Webb wrote a $75,000 check to Priorities USA, the pro-Clinton super political action committee that can accept unlimited donations.
Despite the efforts of Gidwitz and others who have organized more than 50 fundraisers with Trump, the confused universe of large Republican donors limits how much Trump can raise to compete with Clinton.
In June and July, after the two nominees became clear, Trump landed about 1,300 contributors who hit $2,700 or more, compared to 8,000 who did so for Clinton in those two months, the latest finance reports show.
At a bipartisan immigration reform panel earlier this month, Kunkler lashed out, saying he hopes Trump and his supporters are "humiliated" on Election Day.