Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Santorum Suspends Campaign, Leaving Super PACs Without Their Candidates

With the exit of Rick Santorum Tuesday, the Republican primary all but technically ended, leaving in its path a trail of money from people seeking to influence the race by donating to the super PACs, which have spent millions on negative ads against various opponents.

But there's no more opponents.

Three candidates have officially dropped out: Santorum, Rick Perry and Jon Huntsman. The super PACs supporting them had spent more than $14 million combined, and now they're floating in campaign finance purgatory — not spending any more money but not dead yet.

The Red White and Blue Fund, a super PAC backing Santorum, said that Santorum was "suspending his campaign but not the fight.

The PAC supporting Huntsman, Our Destiny, said that after the former ambassador quit the race, it returned all its unused money to the benefactors who had donated it. But the apparatus is still in place and "could spring into action" at a moment's notice for whatever reason, said Fred Davis, a Republican ad man who runs the PAC.

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