AUGUSTA — Auburn Republican Jason Levesque has raised more than $100,000 in his campaign to unseat U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud, but Levesque has only $15,000 in “cash-on-hand,” according to a federal finance report.

Levesque spent the rest on campaign consultants, media personnel and marketing, according to the report filed with the Federal Election Commission.

Michaud, a Democrat who represents Maine’s 2nd Congressional District — including Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties — is running for his fifth term. He has about $520,000 to spend before the November election, according to his latest report.

Most of Michaud’s money has come from political action committees, which are organizations formed by like-minded donors to spend money on specific candidates. Michaud has received PAC money from groups representing labor unions, manufacturing and construction companies, insurance companies, doctors and defense contractors. He’s also collected campaign money from a variety of individual Mainers.

Levesque, who declared his candidacy last spring, earned most of his initial money from donations from owners and presidents of media and marketing firms outside Maine. They were business contacts he made through his own marketing logistics firm, Argo Marketing Group, said Alicia Preston, a campaign spokeswoman.

During his first three-month reporting period, Levesque raised about $54,000 and spent less than $10,000, according to reports. But from July 1 to Dec. 31, reports show Levesque spent about $92,000 and raised about $52,000.

Levesque also has raised some money from individual Mainers, and he has donated about $29,000 to his campaign, including a loan of about $11,000.

He spent the majority of his campaign money, about $62,000, on “Team Levesque,” a group of five strategists, and on fundraising and media consultants.

“It’s all a part of one big process,” spokeswoman Preston said. “You put together a campaign, meet people and that translates into donations and support. We have to get people to know who he is and what he stands for.”

She said the fundraising disparity with Michaud’s campaign was not a concern.

“It costs money to start a campaign,” she said. “We expect (Michaud) to have more money at this point. The majority of it has probably come from PACs, whereas the majority of Jason’s money has come from individuals, which is also telling, I think.”

Greg Olson, Michaud’s only paid campaign staffer, said his candidate wasn’t taking anything for granted.

“Just because we aren’t spending every penny we take in doesn’t mean we aren’t working aggressively on the campaign,” Olson said.

Michaud’s largest expenditure came about a year ago when he spent $50,000 on a Washington, D.C.-based fundraising consultant who helps organize events and line up donors. Olson said the firm, Sutter’s Mill Fundraising, usually charges a monthly fee, but the campaign paid for the election-cycle up front.

“We are trying to be quite frugal in our spending and we are expanding our base of small donors across the state,” Olson said. The campaign spent nearly $11,000 at Foster’s Clam Bake in York Harbor on June 12 and more than $7,000 for an event at the Inn on Peak’s Island on Aug. 20.

Jim Melcher, a political science professor at the University of Maine at Farmington, said Levesque still has plenty of time to raise money and campaign.

“It’s a big hill to climb, but the fact that he doesn’t have a lot of money on hand, well, you wouldn’t really spend it right now, anyway,” Melcher said.

Levesque’s biggest problem is his lack of name recognition, said Mark Brewer, a political scientist at the University of Maine in Orono, who agreed with Melcher that there’s plenty of time left for fundraising.

“Yeah, he needs to worry about (raising money), but it’s not a in-case-of-emergency-break-the-glass, at this point,” Brewer said, adding that national Republican organizations would likely wait to see internal polling on the race before spending money on Levesque’s behalf.

“I don’t think it’s going to be easy to knock off Michaud, even in a down year for Democrats,” Brewer said.

In 2004, Brian Hamel of Presque Isle spent more than $670,000 in an unsuccessful attempt to unseat Michaud after his first term. John Frary of Farmington, Michaud’s opponent in 2008, spent about $300,000, mostly his own money.

The next filings are due on April 15.

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