Bennett spending heavily a year before Senate election

The 2010 U.S. Senate election in Utah is more than a year away, but embattled Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, is spending heavily now — with much of his money coming from the financial industry that benefited from bailouts he initially supported.

He spent nearly $545,000 in the past three months, more than entire congressional campaigns often cost in Utah, new disclosure documents show.

He raised less than he spent, about $390,000, in that quarter. About a fifth of it came from the financial industry, likely interested in his role on the Senate Banking Committee. And $27,750 alone came from Citigroup employees. The company received a $25 billion federal bailout last year.

Bennett's spending went for everything from taking former state delegates to dinners, including inviting all of them to a breakfast meeting with former White House political director Karl Rove, to digging for dirt on his top opponent, building voter databases and buying plenty of campaign hats, pens and tote bags.

"We recognize that our campaign is to get the nomination in convention. That means we need to raise and spend money early" to court likely state GOP delegates, said Jim Bennett, the senator's son and campaign manager.

If a candidate wins 60 percent of delegate votes, he or she automatically become the party's nominee. Otherwise, the top two candidates face off in a primary. Bennett is being challenged by three conservative Republicans so far, including Attorney General Mark Shurtleff. Also, former congressional candidate Tim Bridgewater is entering the race Thursday.

"We're putting in the (campaign) infrastructure to be able to get 60 percent in convention," Jim Bennett said about the campaign's spending.

Some interesting spending included more than $22,000 to Grand America Hotel, where the campaign rented a ballroom and catered a breakfast for delegates to listen to Rove.

The campaign reported spending another $23,000 at local restaurants and hotels for "campaign events," which could be either delegate meetings or fundraisers. "We're doing a lot of one-on-one meetings with people as we're putting together the organization," Jim Bennett said.

Of note, Cherilyn Eagar, one of Bennett's GOP opponents, said she has chosen not to take delegates to dinner unless they pay their own way and she has found that many are willing to do so. She said she views paying for dinners as "trying to buy their votes."