It was one of the biggest stories of the election, long time GOP strategist and veteran campaign operative Boyd Marcus bolted from his party to back the Democratic nominee for Governor Terry McAuliffe.
Marcus, who has served as an aide to Virginia GOP titans like George Allen, Jim Gilmore and Eric Cantor had been running Lt. Governor Bill Bolling's campaign for Governor. That was before the Republican decided against a convention competition with the eventual nominee, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli.
Shortly after Bolling decided to get out of the race, he made it clear he would not support Cuccinelli and even dangled the idea of a long shot independent run for Governor. He eventually decided to stay out of the race all together.
But while Bolling has remained neutral (at least publicly) his confidante Marcus announced that he would go "all in" for McAuliffe. Marcus had never supported a democrat before putting his support behind McAuliffe.
Support isn't the only thing Marcus offered. He also offered McAuliffe his expertise, something the candidate was eager to take advantage of. He hired Marcus and his newly created firm Marcus Consulting LLC. The new formation of a company was a necessity after Marcus decided to leave the party. His long time business partner Ray Allen, who is a close adviser to Cantor, remained loyal to the GOP.
Today we are getting our first glimpse as to how much McAuliffe is paying Marcus for his services. McAuliffe's newly released September financial disclosure report shows Marcus's company receiving two different payments of $10 thousand each. (on 9/4 & 9/26)
McAuliffe has amassed an incredible campaign war chest, which was expected. In September alone the Democrat raised more than $6 million. He has a little more than $1 million in cash on hand and has a series of big fund raisers planned with his close friends Bill and Hillary Clinton.
All told McAuliffe has raised nearly $25 million.
