FUNDRAISING, FROM PAGE 1:

GOP HAS A STABLE OF BIG-MONEY DONORS

super PACs far outspent liberal ones.

This ambitious goal will require the emergence of a new class of at least 20 Democratic donors who can give $5 million or even $10 million each. Recruiting them will not be easy, Ickes said.

“Our side isn’t used to being asked for that kind of money,” Ickes said. “If you asked them to put up $100 million for a hospital wing, they’d be the first in line.”

The hurdles begin with the candidate. While Clinton has committed to meeting personally with potential super PAC donors, people close to her say she has not yet grappled with the kind of big-donor courting that has framed the early months of the Republican race.

She also is navigating the intricate rules on what a candidate may do to help super PACs, which, since the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision in 2010, can raise unlimited funds from individuals and corporations but may not “coordinate” with candidates. Fearful of violating the rules, Clinton plans to limit her direct appeals to donors.

Those appeals also threaten to undercut her message on the corrupting influence of uncheckedmoneyinpolitics:She has called for repealing Citizens United and has said changing the country’s campaign finance system to “get unaccountable money out of it once and for all” would be among her top priorities as president.

Clinton also faces a perception that neither she nor her husband, former President Bill Clinton, is exactly lacking cash. Together, they earned at least $30 million in the past 16 months. And Bill Clinton’s aggressive courting of donors, in the White House and now as the head of the Clinton Foundation, has been an enduring source of controversy. Inflated estimates of Hillary Clinton’s campaign budget — a figure of $2.5 billion was widely circulated — also have been a headache for her campaign and for Priorities USA. A more realistic fundraising target for her campaign, they say, is about $1 billion.

One challenge for Ickes and other fundraisers is convincing potentialdonors,largeandsmall, of the importance of super PACs to Hillary Clinton’s chances. In part to convey that message, Priorities USA recently brought in Guy Cecil, a well-known Democratic operative with close ties to Clinton’s campaign, to lead the organization.

In an interview, Cecil acknowledged the need for a cultural shift among Democratic givers.

“People are starting to understand that Priorities’ work is critical and not just a luxury,” he said. “If we are going to be successful in 2016, it will require more from everyone, at every level.”

Clinton will have little difficulty mustering a large network of so-called bundlers, the donors at the heart of a presidential campaign’s fundraising operation, who solicit contributions limited to a few thousand dollars each from their friends and business associates. But the pool of Democratic super PAC donors is smaller and more specialized: The checks they write are far larger, and the money would go not to Clinton’s campaign but to outside groups such as Priorities USA.

Some of those donors have poured substantial sums into Democratic super PACs in past election cycles: Steyer, a retired California hedge fund founder, invested $74 million in 2014 to pressure candidates to back policies to combat climate change, becoming the Democratic Party’s leading donor. Eychaner, a Chicago media investor active in gay-rights issues, gave at least $22 million to Democratic super PACs in 2012 and 2014.

Other potential super PAC donors, such as Wal-Mart heiress Alice Walton, Los Angeles investor Ron Burkle and media investor Haim Saban, are believed to be prospects this year because of their longstanding ties to the Clinton family. Another possibility, and one of the wealthiest, is former Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York, though most of the millions of dollars he has donated in recent years have gone to his own super PAC, which has backed Republicans as well as Democrats.

Other potential donors of $10 million or more, fearful of being targeted for attacks by Republicans, want to write the biggest checks only when their peers do, forcing Democratic fundraisers to devise what are in effect donor buddy systems, matching up would-be givers who can synchronize their check-writing.

For those still nervous, Priorities USA also is considering resurrecting an affiliated nonprofit group that could accept secret donations. Such fundraising has been roundly denounced by watchdog groups — and, recently, by Clinton.

Democratic fundraisers and super PAC officials acknowledge that a bigger problem is that they are out of practice. The peak for donations to Democratic outside groups was 2004, when hedge fund billionaire George Soros and insurance executive Peter Lewis poured close to $40 million into groups opposing Presi- dent George W. Bush. The groups collected almost $200 million, largely on the strength of liberal donors’ dislike of Bush.

“There will definitely be some sticker shock,” said Michael Vachon, a political adviser to Soros. “The money game has changed even since the last election.”

“Ted Cruz’s super PAC raised $30 million in a few weeks,” Vachon added, “and he has no more chance of being president than I have.”

He said Soros has not decided how much he will give during the 2016 cycle.

Mel Heifetz, a Philadelphia real estate investor who gave $1 million in 2012 to Priorities USA, plans to contribute roughly the same amount for this campaign. But he worries about how much his fellow donors will give.

“Even the wealthy Democrats I know have limitations as to what they’ll contribute,” he said.

In each of the past two election cycles, 14 of the top 20 donors gave their money to conservative organizations and Republican campaigns, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. That does not include most donations to the conservative network overseen by the Kochs, composed largely of nonprofit groups that do not reveal their donors. The network is planning to raise $889 million for its political and philanthropic efforts through 2016.

Sheldon Adelson, the Las Vegas casino developer who spent $93 million in 2012 to support Republican candidates, is likely to invest a similar sum this time. Robert Mercer, a hedge fund executive, has helped bankroll super PACs supporting Cruz, a U.S. senator from Texas. Norman Braman, a billionaire Miami auto dealer, plans to spend $10 million or more to support the campaign of Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. And Foster Friess, a mutual-fund investor in Wyoming who spent more than $2 million in 2012 on Rick Santorum’s bid for the White House, is supporting him again this time.

Democrats concede that they may simply be outgunned in the battle for wealthy donors.

“It’s really David versus Goliath,” said Chris Lehane, a Democratic strategist and adviser to Steyer. They hosted a fundraiser for Clinton at Steyer’s San Francisco home this month, with donations capped at $2,700.

Steyer has not said how much he plans to spend in the 2016 elections, but Lehane said his contributions would be “a drop in the bucket compared to what the Koch brothers and Big Oil are spending to push their agenda.”