Jeff Greene raises $3,000, spends $5.8 million

The billionaire investor and Lohan pal running for Senate in Florida also lost a campaign manager

Published July 15, 2010 7:01PM (EDT)

Jeff Greene, democratic hopeful for Florida's U.S. Senate seat, laughs as he answers a question while speaking at the Florida Press Association and FSNE annual meeting Thursday, June 17, 2010, in Sarasota, Fla.  (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara) (Chris O'meara)
Jeff Greene, democratic hopeful for Florida's U.S. Senate seat, laughs as he answers a question while speaking at the Florida Press Association and FSNE annual meeting Thursday, June 17, 2010, in Sarasota, Fla. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara) (Chris O'meara)

Billionaire real estate investor Jeff Greene is running for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Florida. (When he's not partying with Lindsay Lohan in St. Barth. Which is a thing he was photographed doing this past winter.) And he's obviously got a lot of Floridians excited. Greene just filed his first fundraising report, and he raised a whopping $3,036!

He spent $5.8 million.

(Even that meager $3,000 is baffling. What kind of person donates money to a billionaire?)

Greene recently repeated the common boast of rich people running for office: that, unlike his professional politician opponent, he has "created jobs." Greene made his vast fortune not by building a company that employs humans, but by investing $50,000 in shorting subprime mortgages through credit default swaps. But presumably he kept someone at Merrill Lynch employed. 

And -- busy week for Greene -- his campaign manager quit after two months.


By Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene

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