Portman popular with big donors, and it shows

WASHINGTON – In Ohio's marquee Senate race, P.G. Sittenfeld and Ted Strickland are competing for Democratic dollars and bickering over whose early fundraising figures are more impressive.

Meanwhile, Republican Sen. Rob Portman not only has outstripped the Democratic side of the Ohio ticket in fundraising, he's taken in more money this year than any other Senate GOP incumbent up for re-election.

"Donors love him," Jennifer Duffy, who analyzes Senate races for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, said last fall when Portman was raising millions to help Republicans regain control of the Senate.

That love shows. Portman raised a whopping $20 million for the Senate GOP campaign committee in 2014. He now has more money in the bank — about $8 million — for his own re-election than almost any other incumbent senator who will face the voters in 2016.

"He's sitting pretty," said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks campaign money.

The reason for Portman's fundraising prowess?

He showers donors with attention, sending them emails and giving out his cell phone number. He delves into the policy weeds at fundraising events — eschewing superficial chatter for conversations about tax reform, trade policy, and other issues his business-minded supporters care about. And he's got real power in the Senate, with the ear of the GOP leadership and a seat on some of the most powerful committees.

Portman isn't a "love-you-and-leave-you" politician, said Richard Hylant, executive vice president of Hylant Group, an insurance brokerage firm headquartered in Toledo.

"Some of them… once the check clears, they're moving on to the next fundraiser," Hyland said. "(Portman) will call to ask how things are going — what do you think about this, what's the pulse of the community on that."

"And," Hylant added, "if I call him on an issue or send him a note, I swear to God he responds to me quicker than my wife."

He said Portman has helped him and others in the Toledo community with a bevy of priorities, including securing a federal grant for a local physician working on a new kidney transplant initiative and addressing last summer's water crisis in Lake Erie.

"He takes genuine interest in issues," Hylant said. "I never feel like it's about the campaign re-election cycle."

It doesn't hurt that Portman sits on the Budget and Finance committees, two of the most-coveted panels in the Senate, with broad purview over spending, tax, trade, and health care matters.

Those posts put him front and center in Washington's biggest economic policy battles. He's a champion of reducing the corporate tax rate, he's pushed for entitlement reform, and he's taken a lead in shaping the Senate's "fast-track" trade bill.

"He's got some cash-cow opportunities via his congressional oversight duties," said Krumholz.

She noted that the finance sector is Portman's top source of campaign money. Employees of investment and securities companies donated more than $1.6 million to Portman from 2009 through 2014, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis. Insurance firm employees donated another $1.1 million over that period.

"He's kind of really vacuuming it up from all the industries within the finance sector," Krumholz said.

Allies say Portman isn't the kind of pay-to-play lawmaker who does favors for donors. They say he attracts support because he's serious and substantive, and he's a reasonable Republican voice at a time when the tea party has tugged the GOP to the right.

"On a whole range of issues, Rob Portman lines up very well with many successful people, in terms of his views on the economy, on taxes, on the budget, on regulations," said Rick Lazio, a former congressman who now heads the New York office of a major law firm, Jones Walker. "They connect with him on what he says and the way he presents."

Lazio said that when Portman was charged with helping the National Republican Senatorial Committee raise money in the last election, he decided to learn "to speak the language" of New York's big investors and financiers. So he created a "pitch deck," a tool entrepreneurs typically use to woo potential investors by explaining their business plan and possible return on investment.

Portman then went to mid-town Manhattan for a lunch with about two-dozen so-called "majority-makers," donors who generally give the legal maximum to the GOP every year. He delivered a detailed PowerPoint presentation of how the NRSC would do things differently than it had in 2012, when Republicans failed to gain control of the Senate and left many deep-pocketed donors feeling like the party had wasted their money.

Portman followed up afterward, holding regular meetings with the majority-makers in New York, making himself accessible via phone and email, and answering questions about policy and politics.

"He took a very business-like approach to it," said Rob Collins, executive director of the NRSC during the 2014 election cycle. "He was incredibly disciplined and incredibly accessible, and the donors really appreciated it."

Collins said Portman has a light touch when it comes to asking for money.

His pitch was never "I need money to go beat up the other guys because they're awful," Collins said. Instead, he would tell donors "I'm not a wild-eyed ideologue" and tout his record of working with Democrats to push his legislative priorities.

Nelson Schwab III, managing partner of Carousel Capital, a private investment firm based in North Carolina, said that when he organized a fundraiser for Portman in January, he pitched the senator to his business-leader friends as someone who "can cut through" the polarization in Washington and deliver results.

"He comes across as very genuine, very caring about the problems that we face and very pragmatic about trying to seek a solution," Schwab said. "He's not just giving a bunch of one-liners."

dshesgreen@usatoday.com

Twitter: @dshesgreen