Gallagher’s coffers mostly filled with out-of-state donations

Kirsten Searer

Wednesday, July 14, 2004 | 9:32 a.m.

The bulk of the individual donors giving to Democratic congressional candidate Tom Gallagher are from out of state, campaign finance reports filed Tuesday show.

Of the 190 individual donations Gallagher listed on his finance report turned in Tuesday, 56 came from people who live in Nevada.

Gallagher boasted $545,000 in his campaign coffers and has raised more than $860,000 in but still trails incumbent Rep. Jon Porter, who has more than $1 million in the bank.

Gallagher reported more than $430,000 in contributions in the second quarter. He did show progress with the gaming industry, where many executives have maintained that they will back Porter despite Gallagher having served as the chief executive officer of Caesars Entertainment forerunner Park Place Entertainment.

Mara Gassman, Gallagher's press secretary, said the candidate was raising as much money as he could so he could get his message out.

"We feel that Tom had to make an aggressive fund-raising push, especially since he was challenging an incumbent," she said. "That was going to involve basically aggressively pursuing all outlets."

Gassman said that Gallagher is heartened by the endorsements he has received, seeing that as evidence of "his strength in the legions of working families."

His Web site lists endorsements from the AFL-CIO of Nevada, the Caucus of African-American Nevadans, the Nevada State Education Association, Nevada Carpenters, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and the Service Employees International Union of Nevada.

Among Gallagher's contributors were five members of the Greenspun family, the publishers of the Sun, who gave a total of $13,000; University System Interim Chancellor Jim Rogers and his wife, Beverly, gave a combined $8,000; Mandalay Bay executive Mike Sloan, gave $2,000; and Harrah's Las Vegas executive Claudine Williams, gave $1,000.