2 McCain offices receive threats

John McCain's campaign offices in Colorado and New Hampshire were evacuated yesterday after receiving threatening letters containing an unidentified white powder, officials said.

No injuries were immediately reported, but at least 19 people were examined at hospitals or were quarantined outside the office in Centennial, Colo., a Denver suburb. Authorities were trying to determine whether the powder was hazardous.

A McCain campaign aide said the Manchester, N.H., office had been evacuated and the staffers underwent medical examinations.

Florida authorities are investigating a threatening letter sent to Governor Charlie Crist that contained a suspicious but nontoxic white powder. Investigators said they believe the letter was unrelated to one containing powder received at a McCain office in Colorado.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Unions, firms, other groups will bankroll conventions
Companies, unions, and others trying to influence Washington will be bankrolling much of the Democratic and Republican conventions, a new study reported yesterday.

The Campaign Finance Institute and the Center for Responsive Politics said that more than 170 corporations, unions, and other organizations are expected to host 400 events and put more than $112 million into the conventions - or about $4 of every $5 to put on the shindigs.

There are 141 donors to the host committee in Denver for next week's Democratic gathering, 80 to the host committee in St. Paul for the Republican convention the following week, and 48 that have donated to both, the study found.

FOON RHEE

Clinton still working to pay down her campaign debt
Despite Barack Obama encouraging his supporters to help Hillary Clinton retire her campaign debt, there's little sign that's happening.

Clinton raised less than $2.5 million last month and at month's end still owed nearly $24 million, according to the report filed Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission. She cut her debt by only about $1.2 million. About $13.2 million of Clinton's debt is in loans she made herself, and she has said that any contributions will be used to pay vendors, not herself. Obama raised $51 million during July.

FOON RHEE

McCain withdrawal from primary fund system OK'd
WASHINGTON - The Federal Election Commission voted unanimously yesterday to belatedly approve Republican presidential candidate John McCain's withdrawal from public financing for the primaries.

Had the commission rejected McCain's withdrawal, any money he spent this year in excess of those spending limits would have been in violation of the law and could have been subject to a fine. The commission did not specifically vote on an underlying question raised by the panel's chairman and Democrats: whether McCain used the promise of public funds to secure a loan to his cash-strapped campaign late last year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Survey: Americans want politics, religion separated
While religion and politics have mixed quite liberally this presidential campaign, a new survey out yesterday suggests that a slight majority of Americans want to keep them separate.

The survey from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life and the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press found that conservatives and liberals, Republicans and Democrats, all generally agree.

Overall, 52 percent believe religion should be kept out of politics, up from 44 percent four years ago.

FOON RHEE