The Senator Next Door by Amy Klobuchar

Author:Amy Klobuchar
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781627794183
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.

Raising the Dough

Then there was the daunting task of coming up with $10 million for the campaign. To be a credible candidate, I would have to prove my fundraising prowess from the get-go. This would require raising the money one person at a time by persuading a donor to contribute $20 or $100 or $1,000 or—if I was really lucky—$2,000. Sometimes e-mail solicitations worked, and I knew they worked especially well when candidates took positions that appealed to the base with pungent, attack-dog language. But that wasn’t my style, and I insisted that our e-mails and letters be more positive than those used in the average campaign.

The bulk of the money for the campaign would have to come from my phone calls and my events. Unless you are really famous (okay, that isn’t me), the most effective way to raise money is to call potential donors one at a time or talk with them at a fundraising event. I raised most of my campaign contributions in Minnesota, and when it came to a national fundraising strategy, I knew I couldn’t rely exclusively on events in New York and Los Angeles. I would travel all across the country and meet people in midsize cities like Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Fargo. Every trip and every minute counted: at one point we figured out that to make my $10 million goal, I would have to raise an average of $16,000 a day.

Unlike some candidates, I didn’t get calls from celebrities eager to help me meet that goal—with one memorable exception. One day, out of the blue, we got a call from the songwriter Burt Bacharach, who offered to come to Minnesota to do an event. Burt was true to his word: he arrived at our fundraiser in Wayzata with his own keyboard and then wowed the audience with “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” and “(They Long to Be) Close to You.” Years later I would tease Al Franken about that event. He might have persuaded Conan O’Brien, Jon Hamm, and Amy Poehler to help him out, but he never did get Burt Bacharach.

When I wasn’t at work or traveling around the state, I spent most of my fundraising time sitting alone at our dining room table calling people on the phone. I mostly called people who could afford to give large donations, but I also called potential hosts and attendees for fundraisers, sometimes for small events or house parties. Using “call sheets,” which show a donor’s giving history, I would make call after call after call. Some days I would raise no more than $100 to $250 a person.

Often I made cold calls to people I’d never met. I can’t tell you how hard it is to pretend to be happy when a major donor—someone listed on the call sheet with a record of giving thousands of dollars to male candidates—tells you he will give you $200. I can’t tell you how embarrassing it is when someone answers her phone and then pretends she’s her own assistant to avoid your ask.

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