Politics on the Hudson

The Clinton Foundation this morning released a lengthy list of contributors since its inception in 1997, and in the top 10 is Rochester-area billionaire Tom Golisano, who gave between $10 million and $25 million to the organization.

The list gives ranges of contributions, so it’s unknown specifically how much the Paychex Inc. founder has given, but he has been doling out money to the Clinton Global Initiative since its inception in 2005. He appeared ninth on the list.

Other top individual contributors include real estate heir Stephen Bing, Chicago media mogul Fred Eychaner, Frank Giustra, CEO of the The Radcliffe Foundation, and Theodore W. Waitt, co-founder of Gateway. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation was also high on the list, ranked fourth.

The Associated Press says that Clinton’s foundation has raised at least $41 million from Saudi Arabia and other foreign governments that Hillary Rodham Clinton may end up negotiating with as the next secretary of state.

Those include Saudi Arabia, Norway, Kuwait, Qatar, Brunei, Oman, Italy and Jamaica.

Overall, there are 205,000 donors listed, with nearly 90 percent being at $250 or below, the foundation said.

Golisano and President Clinton have developed a good relationship after Golisano started helping the foundation. Clinton toured Rochester and Buffalo in 2005 with Golisano and took in a Buffalo Sabres game, a team Golisano owns.

And Clinton came back to Buffalo last week for a Sabres game.

They were also together, above, at RIT when Clinton was the keynote speaker there last year.

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