Cain not suspending his appearance schedule

WASHINGTON – His presidential campaign is over, but Herman Cain's self-promotional sojourns across the country will continue.

Two days after the McDonough businessman abruptly ended his campaign, the contours of his next phase remained fuzzy as his campaign began to shutter its doors.

What is clear: Cain will keep his speaking engagements. And Cain's successful fundraising over the past few months has granted him the opportunity, if he chooses, to seek influence in politics. Cain can spend whatever he has remaining of the millions of dollars he has raised campaigning for president on promoting his favorite candidates and his favorite ideas.

Last night in an email to supporters Cain described the new effort as a way to educate the country about the national debt crisis and ways to solve it.

"Unlike a presidential campaign, what we're doing now can't be stopped by scandal-mongering or polls," he wrote. "We're only going to be defeated if we give up. And we're not going to do that."

Cain was scheduled to appear Monday night at a Republican Party fund-raiser in Oklahoma City, with trips to Texas and Maryland on tap this week. Campaign manager Mark Block wrote in an email that Cain is “keeping all commitments to speak.”

Cain has not officially withdrawn from the race, instead saying he was “suspending” his candidacy as the result of the stress on his family from a series of allegations of sexual misconduct, which Cain continues to deny. There is no legal meaning for suspending a campaign, so Cain remains a candidate for the office even if he is not actively running.

Block said Cain will not seek to get on any more presidential primary ballots. His position is already set on the ballot in several states, including New Hampshire, South Carolina, Florida and Georgia. In caucus states such as Iowa – where the first presidential votes will be cast Jan. 3 – participants can caucus for anyone.

Steve Grubbs, Cain’s former Iowa chairman, said it is unlikely anyone would caucus for Cain because voters are concerned with: “Where will my vote be valued?” And Cain clearly is not planning to resuscitate the campaign.

Cain informed his staff in a conference call Monday that they would be paid through the end of the month.

“It was very important to him that people didn’t have to worry about that through the holidays,” Grubbs said.

In the meantime, he was recycling yard signs and unraveling an operation that included, by Friday, 926 precinct captains in the state.

Cain’s “Plan B,” as he dubbed it Saturday, remained unclear. His new website – www.thecainsolutions.com – had only a sign-up page Monday. Cain described the initiative Saturday as a platform to promote his ideas, such as his 9-9-9 tax plan. In Texas today, Cain has a film shoot for his energy independence strategy for Cain Solutions, according to spokesman J.D. Gordon.

Undetermined is what will happen to Cain’s campaign war chest. At the end of September the Cain campaign reported $1.3 million in cash on hand, though Cain had loaned the campaign $675,000 of his own money.

But that campaign finance report was a political lifetime ago. It came before Cain's big surge in poll numbers and funds, along with increased expenditures as Cain beefed up his staff. Between Oct. 1 and Nov. 10, the Cain campaign said it had received $9 million in donations.

He can continue to spend that money as he had before on travel, staff, political donations and other qualified campaign expenditures.

But Paul S. Ryan, an attorney at the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, said it would behoove Cain to terminate his bid officially, then convert his campaign committee into a political action committee – such as a “Super PAC” – that has fewer restrictions on how Cain can spend and raise money.

“A person has every incentive to end their campaign at the earliest time possible because it liberates them from campaign finance law,” Ryan said.

Cain also remains eligible to accept federal matching funds for his campaign. Those funds can be used to pay down debts and pay the “winding down” costs of shuttering offices and complying with federal audits, according to Federal Election Commission rules. Block said the campaign has not decided whether it will accept federal funds.

Block said Cain no longer has Secret Service protection; a detail was assigned to him last month.

Cain has not indicated if and when he will endorse a competitor. Fellow Georgian Newt Gingrich is seen as the most likely recipient of a Cain endorsement, as the two have known each other for more than a decade and Gingrich has replaced Cain as the top conservative challenger to former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney for the Republican nomination. Gingrich spokesman R.C. Hammond said no endorsement would happen before the two meet face to face, and that would be this weekend "at the earliest."

Gingrich, who met with real estate magnate Donald Trump on Monday in New York, is scheduled to be in Iowa on Saturday for a debate.