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Democrats love to cast Republicans as the party of big money, beholden to the out-of-touch billionaires bankrolling their campaigns.

But new numbers tell a very different story one in which Democrats are actually raising more big money than their adversaries.

Among the groups reporting the biggest political ad spending, the 15 top Democrat-aligned committees have outraised the 15 top Republican ones $453 million to $289 million in the 2014 cycle, according to a POLITICO analysis of the most recent Federal Election Commission reports, including those filed over the weekend which cover through the end of last month.

The analysis shows the fundraising edge widening in August, when the Democratic groups pulled in more than twice as much as their GOP counterparts $51 million to $21 million. Thats thanks to a spike in massive checks from increasingly energized labor unions and liberal billionaires like Tom Steyer and Fred Eychaner.

(POLITICO's 2014 race ratings)

So, even as Democrats like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid are working methodically to turn conservative megadonors like the big-giving conservative billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch into the boogeymen of 2014, the party itself is increasingly relying on its deepest pockets as the best chance of staving off a midterm wipeout forecast by oddsmakers.

For example, Steyer, a retired San Francisco hedge fund billionaire, on Aug. 15 stroked a $15 million check to his own NextGen Climate Action super PAC that single-handedly exceeded the combined monthly total raised by the two GOP congressional campaign committees. And his political lieutenant, Chris Lehane, hinted that Steyer, one of the biggest individual donors of 2014, may give more to his super PAC than his $50 million pledge, which Lehane said should not be seen as a ceiling. Steyers spending and that of other Democratic billionaires has helped fuel an advertising gap favoring the partys candidates in key races across the country.

The surprising financial advantage, which has some leading Republicans nervous, is a state of affairs that would have been unthinkable during the 2010 midterms or even the 2012 election. Democrats were badly beaten in those cycles outside-spending derbies by rich conservatives.

(See more from POLITICO's Polling Center)

Democratic megadonors and operatives attribute their big-money surge to a realization that they couldnt compete without embracing the new environment, but they assert its inaccurate to suggest theyre ahead.

Original post:
Dems relying on big donors to win