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Tim Kaine

George Allen

Democrat Tim Kaine outperformed Republican George Allen in fundraising during the second quarter of this year and has more cash in the bank 16 months before a possible clash for an open U.S. Senate seat.

Allen’s campaign reported this morning that the former governor and U.S. senator raised $1.1 million between April 1 and June 30 and finished the fundraising period with a cash balance of about $1.6 million. Allen has raised a total of $2.6 million since entering the race earlier this year.

Kaine, who formally entered the race in April, raised $2.25 million through the end of June. The former governor and Democratic National Committee chairman finished the period with a balance approaching $1.8 million, according to his campaign.

Federal candidates have until Friday to file second-quarter finance reports with the Federal Election Commission.

Allen and Kaine are running for the Senate seat that will be vacated by Democrat Jim Webb, who won’t seek re-election in 2012. Allen held the Senate for one term before losing to Webb in 2006. Four other candidates have announced plans to seek the Republican nomination next year, so Allen must win a GOP primary before getting to a general election contest with Kaine.

One of Allen’s GOP opponents, tea party activist Jamie Radtke, raised $92,153 in the second-quarter and had a June 30 cash balance of almost $46,000, according to her campaign.

Allen’s campaign said 82 percent of its second-quarter donations came from Virginia donors. A campaign aide said Kaine’s fundraising total should not be a surprise given Kaine’s recent tenure as DNC chairman, which has given him access to a deep donor base.

In an appearance this morning on C-SPAN, Kaine said he expects he will have to raise between $15 million and $20 million for his campaign. He said he expects the Virginia contest to be one of the country’s most expensive in 2012.

While the candidates’ finance reports will be closely scrutinized throughout the campaign, they won’t tell the whole story about money influences the 2012 elections. As we saw in last year’s congressional races, outside groups can influence election campaigns with independent expenditures. And those groups don’t have to disclose their donors.

Virginians again are seeing evidence of this, with rival interest groups waging a television ad war in the dead of summer more than a year before the 2012 elections.

– Michael Sluss