Tipsheet

Tables Turned: Wall Street Ditches Obama, Runs to Romney

The good ol' days seem to be over for President Obama as some of his biggest Wall Street donors are choosing to give their 1 percent dollars to rival Mitt Romney this election cycle.

Individuals who work in the securities and investment industry have given the Romney campaign $8.5 million through the end of April, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics.

Over the same time period, Obama has brought in only $3 million from securities and investment workers, and the industry is only the campaign's fifth largest source of funds.

"They have basically ditched Obama," said John Dunbar, the managing editor for politics at the Center for Public Integrity. "Romney is just a much friendlier candidate if you are a banker."

The absence of Wall Street love is a departure from the norm for the Obama campaign. In 2008, then-Senator Obama raised almost $16 million from Wall Street. John McCain, the Republican nominee, received donations totaling only $9 million.

Considering President Obama has done nothing to kick start the economy throughout the past four years while slamming the "rich" and repeatedly sounding the bells of class warfare by calling on Wall Street to "pay their fair share," this shift isn't surprising. Not to mention, Romney is a business guy, something he and Wall Street workers have in common. 

On the money front, this is bad news for President Obama. Not only did his campaign spend more than it took in last month, Romney is crushing him in Super PAC fundraising.