In the shadow of the supersize "super PACs" that have reshaped the battle for the White House and Senate, a new and potentially potent kind of super PAC is proliferating in the closing weeks of the campaign and taking aim at House races.
Max Reed for The New York Times
Patrick Murphy, a Democrat running for Congress in Florida, is backed by the super PAC American Sunrise.
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Treasure Coast Jobs Coalition supports the incumbent, Allen B. West.
With some of the groups backing Democrats and some supporting Republicans, they are picking a few Congressional races in which advertising is cheaper or the airwaves less cluttered and transforming them with a barrage of outside money, swamping incumbents and challengers alike.
In Utah and Georgia, a group known as Center Forward, headed by a retired Democratic lawmaker turned Beltway lobbyist, has spent $1 million attacking two Republican candidates. In Florida, the Treasure Coast Jobs Coalition has spent nearly $1 million against Patrick Murphy, a Democratic candidate, and supporting Representative Allen B. West, the Republican incumbent.
Now or Never PAC, a Missouri-based group, has spent more than $900,000 to aid a Republican incumbent in neighboring Illinois, Representative Joe Walsh, a Chicago-area lawmaker who had been outspent by his Democratic challenger until the group entered the race.
"It doesn't make any sense for us to spend the several million dollars that we expect to raise in the Connecticut Senate race," said Tyler Harber, a strategist for Now or Never. "We've focused on races where our involvement could have a positive impact — and perhaps bring other groups in."
The emergence of smaller super PACs helped fuel a surge in September advertising by outside groups in House races: Far more money was being spent far earlier than for the 2010 elections, when Republicans won control of the House.
Through the beginning of October, super PACs and other outside groups reported at least $38.5 million in independent spending to the Federal Election Commission, nearly seven times as much as they spent during the same period in 2010. Almost all of that money was spent in September, according to a New York Times analysis, as outside groups reacted to swings in the presidential race and exploited redistricting, which has left many incumbents with thousands of new constituents who are unfamiliar with them.
And Democratic-leaning groups have narrowed the spending gap, with about $19.8 million of the total backing Republicans and $18 million backing Democrats. Those totals do not include issue ads that groups are not required to disclose to the Federal Election Commision, or the significant spending — of both disclosed and secret money — that big-spending groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have already planned.
The large disparity in outside spending that helped Republicans win the House in 2010 did not emerge until after September, and a similar surge by major outside groups is likely in the coming weeks. But the early spending this year suggests how much impact smaller outside groups believe they can have in House races in which the candidates themselves spend far less money and the cost of influencing voters can be lower than in the presidential or Senate contests.
The donors and political consultants behind many of the groups began officially incorporating them over the summer, so they have not yet had to file any disclosures that would reveal ties between the interests financing the attacks and the lawmakers benefiting from them.
But other groups that have filed disclosures appear to be mimicking some of the big super PACs that played a pivotal role in the Republican presidential primary this year, serving as vehicles for wealthy donors, friends and family members to pour additional money into a race after they have already given the maximum allowed to the candidate's own campaign.
American Sunrise, which is supporting Mr. Murphy in the Florida race, has raised $250,000, most of its reported funding, from Mr. Murphy's father. A few donors have also provided much of the money for Now or Never PAC: Of the $484,000 the group has reported raising, $250,000 came from Stanley Herzog, a Missouri construction magnate.
Derek Willis contributed reporting.
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