Rancho Santa Margarita's Top Democratic Presidential Campaign Contributors

There just aren’t a lot of big Democratic donors living in Rancho Santa Margarita, according to federal campaign records.

Voters in 12 states take to the polls on Super Tuesday, March 1, to cast their ballots for the presidential nomination in each party, and if campaign contributions are any indication of appeal, Hillary Clinton should be a big winner on the democratic side.

While the California primary isn’t until June, several of your neighbors have already shelled out big bucks in support of their favored candidate. That just doesn’t include many Democrats in Rancho Santa Margarita (Patch will examine Republican donor spending next week).

Clinton has one big-spender in Coto de Caza Grace Cheung, who contributed $2,700, the maximum an individual can donate to a campaign allowed under federal law. There were none in Rancho Santa Margarita.

Overall, she has 1526 donors in South County cities. However, only two of them are from Rancho Santa Margarita Mary Wagner and Pamela Lavoie. They gave a combined $700.

Sanders has no big money donors in the area, but he does have 1981 donors in South County, who gave smaller amounts. He nabbed 40 small donations from residents in Rancho Santa Margarita and Coto de Caza ranging from $13 to $1,000. His biggest donor in Rancho Santa Margarita is Stacey Burns who gave $1,000.

Californian’s have given $28,562,022 to Democratic candidates and $18,789,272 to Republicans.

Clinton has received $21,899,489 so far in campaign donations from people in the state, according to publicly available contribution data from the Federal Election Commission.

Her rival, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, has raised $$6,109,590 in California.

That’s somewhat in line with nationwide numbers that show Clinton with $126.4 million in individual contributions compared to $95.4 million for Sanders.

Those numbers, though, are a bit misleading.

While Clinton’s campaign has raised big bucks from individuals, she’s also been helped by massive money pouring in through Priorities USA Action, a pro-Clinton Super PAC that has raised more than $50 million in support of the former Secretary of State, according to OpenSecrets.

Sanders has raised just $44,968 from outside groups, according to OpenSecrets.

Following voting in three states, Clinton leads Sanders in pledged delegates, 52 to 51. But Clinton holds a commanding lead over the Vermont Sen. in the race for the nomination overall with the support of 445 superdelegates compared to just 18 superdelegates for Sanders.