Photograph by Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images

A President Barack Obama supporter in Des Moines, Iowa.

That’s how much super-political action committees have raised thus far in the 2012 election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group in Washington that tracks political giving.

Super-PACs grew out of a series of regulatory and court rulings in 2010 including the Citizens United case, which the Supreme Court affirmed yesterday in invalidating a Montana statute banning independent political spending by corporations.

While more than 600 super-PACs have been created, just four have accounted for 56 percent of their total receipts.

Restore Our Future, a super-PAC that backs Republican Mitt Romney for president, raised $61.5 million through May, followed by American Crossroads, another Republican super-PAC, with $34.5 million. Winning Our Future raised $23.9 million, most of it from billionaire casino executive Sheldon Adelson and his family.

Priorities USA Action, which backs President Barack Obama’s re-election, raised $14.6 million.

Obama and Romney are busy raising cash for their own campaigns, as both look to close June with a spurt of money that they can brandish to supporters and the press.

The president raised money yesterday in Boston and is collecting contributions in Atlanta and Miami today, Bloomberg’s Margaret Talev writes. Romney is campaigning in Virginia, one of about a dozen states that Democratic and Republican strategists consider as competitive.

On other fronts:

Julie Hirschfeld Davis writes about how the immigration issue is a political “minefield” for Obama and Romney after the Supreme Court struck down most of Arizona’s curbs on illegal immigration yesterday.

It’s primary election day in five states including New York, where the marquee race is Harlem Democrat Charles Rangel’s bid for a 22^nd House term. Peter Green writes about Rangel for Political Capital, which also features my own preview of key primaries to watch.

Original post is Bloomberg by the Numbers: $240 M by Political Capital.

Photograph by Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

President Barack Obama during a campaign rally at Hillsborough Community College on June 22, 2012 in Tampa, Florida.

That’s how many electoral votes President Barack Obama would have won in the 2008 election if it were re-run using revised Electoral College vote allocations that will be in effect for the November election.

That’s a decrease of six from the 365 electoral votes that Obama actually won four years ago.

Obama’s revised vote total shrinks because Republican-leaning states generally gained House seats at the expense of Democratic-leaning states in a reapportionment following the 2010 Census. A state’s Electoral College vote is the sum of its House seats and its two Senate seats.

To reach the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency, Republican challenger Mitt Romney would need a net gain of 91 electoral votes above the revised 2008 Republican total of 179. He’s trying to do this in part by attacking a national health-care overhaul that Obama signed into law in 2010. The Supreme Court will issue a decision June 28 on the president’s signature domestic policy achievement.

SUPREME DECISION: While there was no ruling from the Supreme Court today on the health-care law, it did strike down part of an Arizona law that targets illegal immigration and also invalidated Montana’s ban on corporate campaign spending. Greg Stohr has more on the court’s immigration decision. He and Julie Bykowicz have a story about the Montana decision.

MARRIED MOMS: Obama and Romney are targeting the votes of married mothers, a bloc that votes less Democratic than the broader female voting population, Esme E. Deprez writes.

MITT MONEY: Lisa Lerer has the details of a retreat Romney hosted for top campaign fundraisers in Park City, Utah, over the weekend.

Original post is Bloomberg by the Numbers: 359 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Mitt Romney in Davenport, Iowa.

That’s the number of electoral votes in the four states where Mitt Romney began airing new television ads today with promises about what he would do in his first 100 days as president.

The ads are running in Ohio (18 electoral votes), North Carolina (15), Virginia (13) and Iowa (6). All four states backed President Barack Obama in the 2008 election, with margins of victory ranging from three-tenths of one percentage point in North Carolina to 9.5 percentage points in Iowa.

Those four states are among the eight that backed Obama by fewer than 10 points. Romney needs to win most of the eight to win the presidency.

The North Carolina, Virginia and Iowa spots begin with a promise that Romney will “move to repeal” the 2010 health-care law requiring individuals to purchase insurance. The Ohio spot doesn’t mention health care, beginning instead with a narrator saying Romney will show that he “stands up to China” and “demands a level playing field for our businesses and workers.”

The Virginia and Iowa ads promise to curb federal budget deficits beginning with “$20 billion in savings” that aren’t specified. The North Carolina spot promises “new banking and high-tech jobs” in a state that includes the headquarters of Bank of America Corp. and Wachovia Corp. in Charlotte.

Bloomberg News has more coverage today of its poll, which asked 1,002 U.S. adults, including 734 who are likely to vote in the November election, between June 15-18 about their views of Obama, Romney and policy issues.

Michael Tackett explains why Bloomberg’s poll showing Obama with a 13-point lead, 53 percent to 40 percent, might differ from two other surveys that gave Obama a smaller lead.

Julie Hirschfeld Davis looks at the candidate preferences of some key swing voting groups including suburban independents, Catholics, married mothers and working voters earning $75,000 to $99,999.

Another key voting bloc is Hispanics, who account for about 17 percent of the nation’s population. Obama is speaking today to the convention of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, where he may tout his announcement last week that his administration will end deportation proceedings against younger illegal immigrants who meet certain requirements. Romney spoke at the same event yesterday and criticized Obama’s immigration policy. John McCormick has more.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 52 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Valentin Flauraud/Bloomberg

Shopping

That’s the share of people who think the U.S. economy is improving, compared to 33 percent who say it’s getting worse and 43 percent who say it’s staying the same, according to the Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index. The 11-point gap is the biggest in monthly tracking since a 19-point gap in mid-January, when 19 percent of respondents said the economy was getting better and 38 percent said it was getting worse.

Here’s a look at some economic and political topics Bloomberg is watching today:

REVISE, NOT REPEAL: About 43 percent of Americans may want small modifications to the health-care law though they want to see how it works, according to a Bloomberg National Poll. That compares to 34 percent who want to repeal the measure. The Supreme Court will rule on the law in the next week. Heidi Przybyla has more about the poll.

ON THE ATTACK: Voters may decry so-called ‘negative’ television advertisements even as they respond to their messages. Lisa Lerer writes about how voters believe attacks by President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney that the opposition is “out of touch” with the everyday concerns of Americans.

MONEY MAVENS: Obama intensified his campaign spending in May as Romney focused on replenishing a campaign treasury he depleted to win the Republican presidential nomination. Obama spent $44.6 million in May, more than the $39.1 million he raised during the month — and more than three times the $14.6 million the president spent in April. Romney raised $23.4 million in May, about twice as much as he took in the previous month. Jonathan Salant and I analyze the campaign reports.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 22 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Patrick Fallon/Bloomberg

Shoppers in Santa Monica, California.

That’s the share of respondents to a Bloomberg National Poll who said they are better off than they were when President Barack Obama was inaugurated, compared with 36 percent who said they are worse off and 17 percent who said their position is about the same.

Bloomberg’s David J. Lynch examines voter response to economy-related questions in the poll. One finding: a 44 percent plurality of respondents said that their household income is about the same as a year ago, compared to 28 percent who said they were better off and 22 percent who said they were worse off.

Obama led Republican challenger Mitt Romney by 53 percent to 40 percent among likely voters, the poll found, even as economic indicators such as initial jobless claims point to a struggling economy on the president’s watch. Bloomberg’s Julie Hirschfeld Davis analyzes the Obama-Romney numbers in the survey, which showed that 55 percent view Romney as more out of touch with average Americans, compared to 36 percent who said that about Obama.

One state where Obama and Romney seem closely matched is Florida. The state has 29 electoral votes, tied for third with New York and the most among states where the 2008 presidential election was decided by less than 10 percentage points. One challenge for Romney: the state’s governor,  Republican Rick Scott, has a 39 percent approval rating after 18 months in office. Bloomberg’s Michael C. Bender has more about Scott.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 45 by Political Capital.

Photograph by David McNew/Getty Images

Antonio Villaraigosa is greeted by Filipino World War II veterans, including some who were on the Bataan Death March, at the Philippine Village Community Center in the Los Angeles.

That’s the number of U.S. residents of Asian descent, according to Census Bureau estimates as of July 1, 2011. Asian-Americans accounted for about 5.8 percent of the nation’s population at that time, Census data show.

Asians have surpassed Hispanics as the largest bloc of new U.S. immigrants, a Pew Research Center report said today. They prefer the Democratic Party over Republicans by a wider margin than do Americans as a whole, the survey shows. Asians were 36 percent of new U.S. immigrants in 2010, up from 19 percent in 2000; Hispanics were 31 percent of new U.S. immigrants in 2010, down from 59 percent a decade earlier.

Hispanics are still the largest racial or ethnic minority group, at 16.7 percent of the population.

President Obama’s decision to end deportations of some illegal immigrants brought to the U.S. as children highlights the importance of Hispanic voters in the November election. Likely voters back the new policy by a 64 percent to 30 percent margin, a Bloomberg National Poll shows.

Mitt Romney hasn’t taken a position on Obama’s immigration policy, though he said the president’s announcement was driven by political considerations. Romney is finishing up a six-state, five-day bus tour in Michigan, where he was born.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 18.2 million by Political Capital.

Photograph by Evan Vucci/AP Photo

Mitt Romney, left, and Gov. Scott Walker at Monterey Mills during a campaign stop on June 18, 2012 in Janesville, Wis.

That’s the number of electoral votes in the six states on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s campaign bus tour, which takes him to Wisconsin (10 electoral votes) and Iowa (6) today.

Romney will conclude the tour tomorrow in Michigan (16), his birth state. He visited New Hampshire (4) on Friday, Pennsylvania (20) on Saturday and Ohio (18) yesterday.

President Barack Obama won all six states in the 2008 election with margins ranging from 4.6 percentage points in Ohio to 16.5 percentage points in Michigan. Four of the six states voted Democratic in the 2004 presidential election, with Iowa and Ohio opting to re-elect Republican President George W. Bush. All but New Hampshire and Ohio voted Democratic in 2000.

Romney needs to wrest some of these 74 electoral votes from Obama to win the presidency. Obama won 365 electoral votes in the 2008 election, adjusted to 359 to reflect a reallocation of electoral votes after the 2010 census. That’s 89 electoral votes more than the 270 needed to win.

Romney campaigned in Ohio yesterday with House Speaker John Boehner, who represents southwestern Ohio, and Ohio Senator Rob Portman, who may merit consideration as a vice-presidential running mate for Romney. Bloomberg’s Margaret Talev has the story.

Romney also taped an interview for the CBS “Face the Nation” program in which he said that the Federal Reserve’s attempts at stimulating the economy “did not have the desired effect.” Talev and Roxana Tiron have more on that.

Obama traveled to Mexico late yesterday for the G-20 summit, at which world leaders will discuss Europe’s debt crisis.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 74 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Matthew Staver/Bloomberg

A teen fills out a job application during The Summer Youth Jobs & Training Expo 2012 at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver.

That’s the share of the nation’s net decline in full-time jobs among workers under age 25, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Youth employment is an issue in the presidential election between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney. Obama won about two-thirds support of 18-to-29 voters in the 2008 election, though he may find it more challenging to retain that level of backing amid a sluggish economic recovery.

Bloomberg’s Mike Dorning writes about the challenges facing young workers, and the political repercussions for Obama, in a story that notes that one in six 16- to 24-year-olds last year neither worked nor attended school.

Obama is “detached and distant” from the economic concerns of average Americans, Romney said today in New Hampshire, one of about 10 closely contested states that will decide the November election. Bloomberg’s Lisa Lerer has the story.

Romney’s New Hampshire appearance marked the start of a five-day, six-state bus tour that will also take the former Massachusetts governor to Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa and Michigan. Obama won all six states in 2008, with margins of victory ranging from 4.6 percentage points in Ohio to 16.5 percentage points in Michigan. Lerer has more about Romney’s road trip.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 41 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

A gasoline delivery in San Anselmo, California.

That’s the drop in cents of the average price of a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline in the past 10 weeks. The price was $3.532 yesterday, a four-month low down from a 2012 high of $3.936 on April 4.

Declining gas prices may explain why the Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index rose to minus 36.4 in the week ended June 10 from minus 37.6.

“Gasoline prices may be helping: A serious irritant when rising, they’ve eased by 22 cents a gallon since the first week of May, to their lowest since mid-February,” Langer Research Associates, which produces the index, said in a written analysis.

“Households feel a bit more comfortably about their own financial situation,” Joseph Brusuelas, a senior economist at Bloomberg LP in New York, told Bloomberg News’ Michelle Jamrisko, who wrote an analysis of this week’s index.

The labor market continues to struggle, though. Initial jobless claims unexpectedly climbed by 6,000 to 386,000 in the week ended June 9, Bloomberg’s Alex Kowalski reports. Economists had projected claims would fall to 375,000.

The economy is the focus of this year’s presidential election. President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney will campaign in Ohio and also attend fundraisers. Julie Hirschfeld Davis previews the Ohio campaign stops in a story that also reports on Romney’s speech yesterday to the Business Roundtable quarterly meeting in Washington. No Republican has ever been elected president without winning Ohio.

Obama will raise money tonight at the New York home of actress Sarah Jessica Parker and her husband, actor Matthew Broderick. Kate Andersen Brower has more about this fundraiser in a story that looks at how Obama is raising money from entertainment industry “to help fill the fundraising hole left by defections of some Wall Street donors.”

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: 40 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Mark Lennihan/AP Photo

JPMorgan office building in New York.

That’s the estimated amount of trading losses at the chief investment office of JP Morgan Chase & Co. The losses may be higher, though the $2 billion figure probably will be mentioned today at a Senate Banking Committee hearing in Washington at which chief executive officer Jamie Dimon will be the lone witness. The hearing — “A Breakdown in Risk Management: What Went Wrong at JPMorgan Chase?” — begins at 10 a.m. eastern.

Dimon will apologize for the trading losses, according to Bloomberg’s Dawn Kopecki and Phil Mattingly. “We have let a lot of people down, and we are sorry for it,” Dimon said in prepared remarks.

Mattingly writes about Banking Committee chairman Tim Johnson, a South Dakota Democrat who will lead the questioning of Dimon.

Bloomberg Government analysts have thought of some questions they would ask Dimon.

Also worth reading: “House Of Dimon Marred By CEO Complacency Over Unit’s Risk,” by Erik Schatzker, Bradley Keoun and Kopecki.

Original post is Magic Number of the Day: $2 Billion by Political Capital.