One Hundred Fourteen Million Reasons

While The Donald may be leading the polls right now, few Republicans believe he'll end up being the nominee.  And while the guy does have his own fortune in the billions, he's no match for Jeb Bush's fundraising tsunami.

Jeb Bush raised $11.4 million in his first 16 days as a presidential candidate, and the super PAC he tirelessly fundraised for before he formally entered the race netted $103 million in the first six months of 2015. 

The combined haul of the campaign and super PAC—$114 million—is likely double his closest competitor in the money race. 

It appears Bush raised even more than what was disclosed on Thursday. That mammoth figure still doesn't include a third political committee in Bush's orbit, the Right to Rise PAC Inc. When Bush first announced last December that he was "actively" exploring a presidential run, he said he was forming a PAC to help promote "leaders, ideas and policies." Neither the super PAC nor campaign responded to an inquiry about the other PAC's fundraising figures in 2015. 

The former Florida governor, as the son and brother of the last two Republican presidents, has long been expected to be the top fundraiser in the GOP field. His campaign team had downplayed talk of raising $100 million since the figure was first floated months ago, but in the end they blew past that figure by 14 percent. 

Bush formally declared his candidacy in Miami on June 15 and raised an average of $710,000 per day for the rest of the month. To put his $11.4 million haul in perspective, it would require Bush to have raised the maximum donation of $2,700 in primary dollars from more than 4,200 donors—in 16 days.

His super PAC, Right to Rise USA, run by one of Bush's longtime confidantes, is not constrained by contribution limits. Bush had roughly 500 donors contribute more than $25,000, according to figures released by his super PAC Thursday. Of the $103 million raised, the super PAC said that it had more than $98 million cash on hand.

And keep in mind Jeb can deploy that money now, a whole 16 months before the race, and six months before the earliest primaries.  If he keeps piling on money at this rate, plus pick up the money from his competitors once winning the primary, Jeb'll have half a billion plus on hand to buy the 2016 race at minimum.

In reality, he'll probably have billions to work with through PACs.  He'll need it to try to sell himself to the America public.

Question is, will we buy another four years of Bush?