WaPo’s Jason Horowitz: Risky career move paid off for fundraiser Rob Collins — and the Republicans
This month, he boasted that his group would hit its $25 million fundraising goal and injected $16 million into ad campaigns targeting 22 House Democrats. In contrast to the donors supplying that cash, Collins does not shy from attention. He is eager to step out of the shadow cast by Fred Malek, the Republican bundler and McCain 2008 finance chair who conceived of the American Action Network, and Karl Rove, whose brainchild organizations, American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, share office space with Collins and have raised more than $50 million.
In a new political era marked by anonymous and rampant donations, Collins, a former chief of staff to the fast-rising House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and a veteran of more than a dozen campaigns, is part of a small circle of operatives with the coveted expertise of actually running such secretive organizations. And as Republicans expect to retake the House and set their sights on the presidency, the architects of the party’s resurgence and some of its most promising leaders see the 36-year-old as a top catch. He is already dressing the part.