Lazio Raises with Romney, Wall Street

ALBANY—Here's an invitation to a fund-raiser Rick Lazio is holding next week in Manhattan—the night after Barack Obama comes to town—featuring Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts and failed presidential candidate.

Lazio is the only announced Republican candidate for governor, having formally kicked off his campaign earlier this month. His team contains many people with connections to Romney, and a Romney spokesman said "stay tuned" when pressed by the Boston Globe about an endorsement. Romney ran against Rudy Giuliani, a presumptive Republican gubernatorial candidate, for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

The fund-raising committee has a lot of Wall-Street muscle: John C. Whitehead, the former head of Goldman Sachs; Julian Robertson of the now-defunct Tiger Fund; William Harrison, a former executive at J.P. Morgan (where Lazio had been hanging his shingle); John Snow, the former treasury secretary; Glenn Hubbard, dean of Columbia Business School and Lewie Ranieri, one of the pioneers of mortgage-backed securities. Also interesting is Constantine Sidamon-Eristoff, the father of Andrew Eristoff, who wrote a report recommending modernization of the New York Republican Party.

The event is Oct. 21 at the Sheraton. Lazio and Romney will also hold a pre-reception for Republican County chairs, and another pre-reception for high-dollar bundlers. The event itself is $500 a head.