POSTED: 3:37 p.m. EST November 1, 2002

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The North Carolina race between former GOP presidential candidate Elizabeth Dole and former Clinton administration official Erskine Bowles is the nation's costliest Senate contest so far this election.

ELECTION 2002 WRAL.com Politics Section

Together, the two have spent more than $20 million to try to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Jesse Helms, according to a Federal Election Commission analysis released Friday.

Dole's campaign has spent at least $11.5 million, compared with $9.2 million for Bowles, who has made or backed $4 million in loans to his campaign. Dole, who ran for president in 2000, is a former U.S. labor secretary and transportation secretary. Bowles was chief of staff in the Clinton White House.

On the House side, a West Virginia race between first-term Republican Rep. Shelley Moore Capito and Democratic businessman Jim Humphreys was the costliest matchup as of mid-October, the FEC's review of campaign finance reports found.

Humphreys has spent at least $6 million, most of it his own money, to try to unseat Capito. Capito's campaign had spent $2.1 million, as of mid-month.

The candidates in both races would have to spend millions more in the campaigns' final days to beat Senate and House spending records set in the 2000 election.

Democrat and former investment banker Jon Corzine spent more than $60 million of his own money on his successful New Jersey Senate race that year.

California holds the record for the most expensive House race: Democrat Adam Schiff and Republican Rep. James Rogan together spent $11.1 million on their 2000 Los Angeles-area contest. Schiff defeated Rogan.

The FEC analysis found that overall, House and Senate candidates in Tuesday's election had raised $727.9 million and spent $617.4 million from January 2001 through Oct. 16.

-- Anonymous, November 01, 2002