RNC Can't Pay Its Bills -- Cites 'Cash Flow' Problem

The Republican National Committee, the GOP's fundraising and organizational arm, is facing a "cashflow challenge" and can't pay all of its bills on time.

In a memo Tuesday, RNC Chief Administrative Officer Boyd Rutherford wrote, "We will not be able to pay off the vendors this week. We will be slow in paying as we are having a cashflow challenge. Everyone will be slow paid until after the first of the year."

The acknowledgment by Rutherford of the RNC's money woes comes at a bad time for the group's chairman, Michael Steele, who already faces several potential challengers for another two-year term, writes the Washington Post's Chris Cillizza. Aside from Steele's verbal gaffes, the cash-flow issue is likely to re-open the debate about his financial stewardship, the Post said.

In its most recent filing with the Federal Election Commission, current through mid-October, the GOP organization reported $4.5 million in debt and $3.8 million in cash on hand -- not an unusual amount of debt for a party committee in the midst of a hotly contested campaign. Its next fundraising report is due Friday at the FEC.

Meanwhile, Derek Flowers, the RNC political team member whom Rutherford informed of the money crunch, resigned Thursday, the Post reported. An RNC spokeswoman told the newspaper, "All invoices received by the RNC are accounted for and paid in a timely manner."

As Politics Daily's Jill Lawrence reported Monday, the names of three women are in the mix to lead the committee: Ann Wagner, a former RNC member and co-chair and a former ambassador to Luxembourg, who has already declared her intentions, and two others who might -- Carly Fiorina, the former Hewlett Packard CEO who just lost a California Senate race to Democrat Barbara Boxer; and Maria Cino, who was CEO of the 2008 Republican convention in St. Paul, Minn.

Among men interested in the chairmanship, former Michigan GOP chairman Saul Anuzis is running and Gentry Collins is looking likely. Collins was until recently political director of the RNC and made a splash by releasing a resignation letter detailing the sorry financial and operational state of the RNC under Steele.