Mitt Romney's presidential campaign released fundraising figures for the month of January this evening showing a nearly $5 million drop-off from his December 2011 total.
Romney raised just over $6.5 million in January, which places in the bottom half the 10 months he has been in the race. June, September, and December usually have higher totals due to end-of-quarter fundraising pushes, but Romney raised more in May and November of 2011, when there were no immediate reporting deadlines.
Romney raised just $0.35 for ever dollar his campaign spent in January, dropping $18.7 million in an as-yet-unsuccessful bid to seal his place as the likely Republican nominee.
The result is at least partly a factor of Romney's fluctuating position in the polls. Romney narrowly lost the Iowa Caucuses in early January, and was handily defeated in the South Carolina primary in the middle of the month. He won the New Hampshire primary on January 10, as well as the Florida primary at the close of the reporting period.
Romney is also struggling to overcome a lack of enthusiasm among the broader GOP donor base, reliant on large donors for most of his fundraising haul. Many of those donors have already hit the $2,500 maximum primary contribution, leaving the campaign scrambling to find more wealthy contributors.