This is an impressive crowd—the haves and the have-mores. Some people call you the elite; I call you my base.

George W. Bush delivered this line as a self-deprecating joke at a high-dollar Republican fundraising event during the 2000 presidential campaign. Speaking to an audience of wealthy donors, he played on critiques that the GOP catered to the affluent by labeling the attendees “the haves and the have-mores,” then puncturing the moment with the punchline that they were his political “base.” The remark circulated widely afterward as an emblem of Bush’s folksy humor and as a sound bite used by both supporters (as evidence of candor) and critics (as evidence of coziness with moneyed interests).

The quip works by acknowledging, then reframing, a common accusation: that Republican candidates rely on and govern for the wealthy. By calling the audience “the haves and the have-mores,” Bush signals awareness of economic stratification and of the optics of fundraising among elites. The punchline—“I call you my base”—turns that critique into comic candor, implying that financial backers are foundational to campaign success. Read sympathetically, it is an attempt at disarming humor and rapport-building; read critically, it can be taken as an unguarded admission that political influence follows wealth, highlighting tensions between democratic ideals and the realities of campaign finance.