Huffington Outspent Feinstein 2 1/2-to-1; Total for Race Is Record : Politics: The congressman used $27.5 million of his own money, reports show. His campaign spent the equivalent of $7.62 per vote.

Republican Mike Huffington outspent Democrat Dianne Feinstein by a 2 1/2-to-1 margin and their combined spending topped $41.4 million, a record for a Senate race.

Huffington spent $29,070,533, including a record $27,543,680 of his own money on the race, the campaign expenditure reports obtained Tuesday reveal.

Feinstein spent $12,490,061, including $2,525,989 of her own funds.

Feinstein defeated Huffington 3,976,885 votes to 3,811,232, a margin of 46.8% to 44.9%, in the latest unofficial tally. The remaining 8.3% was divided among four minor party candidates.

That amounted to $7.62 per vote for Huffington to $3.14 per vote for Feinstein.

An even greater contrast is how much of their personal funds the two multimillionaire candidates spent per vote: Huffington spent $7.22 per vote, while Feinstein spent 63 cents per vote.

Huffington’s personal spending per vote is more than double the $3.22 per vote that billionaire Ross Perot spent on his presidential campaign in 1992.

According to Huffington’s report, received Tuesday by the secretary of state, he contributed $15,543,680 to his campaign and loaned it an additional $12 million.

Feinstein made outright contributions of only $3,989 to her campaign, and she loaned it $2,522,000, including a reported $982,000 from a mortgage on her San Francisco home.

The previous total spending record for a Senate race was $25 million by Republican Jesse Helms and Democrat Harvey Gantt in North Carolina in 1990.

Huffington’s personal fortune, from the sale of his family’s oil and gas business, has been estimated at $70 million. Feinstein and her investment banker husband, Richard Blum, are worth an estimated $40 million to $50 million.

Huffington has still not conceded the election, which is scheduled to be officially certified by the end of this week. He says “there’s an immense amount of evidence of voter fraud.”