It’s being reported that Mitt Romney has spend $35 million on his [del]lost[/del] suspended campaign.
This is dwarfed by Ross Perot who “spent an estimated $65.4 million of his own money.” (wiki)
Is this a record or has anyone spent more?
Perot has the record. By moving directly to the general election, he spent the most the fastest.
Considering the time and inflation, you could make a good case for John Connolly:
Tom Golisano spent $93 million of his own money on his three runs for Governor of New York. There are other recent examples of millionaires running for the Senate using mostly their own money, like Mike Ciresi and Blair Hull. This 2006 article says:
I think the reporter means for a congressional race, but he doesn’t cite a source so I’m not sure. Frankly, I suspect that number might be wrong.
This has always astounded me. For that kind of money you could buy a dozen Congress-critters, who would do your bidding like good little boys/girls. Why try to be one?
No, you can’t. Not legally, anyway. Since the advent of campaign finance laws, the only person to whom you can donate huge amounts of money for federal office is yourself.
I wasn’t talking legal, which is why I used the term “buy.” 
Congress-critters still take bribes.
Not a factual answer / more a possible / plausible future record setter:
In late December, Maggie Haberman reported that people close to NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg have said that if he runs for President, he’ll spend up to one year’s salary ($1 billion) on an independent run. Considering the fact that in 2004, a little more that double ($2.1 billion) was spent by all presidential & congressional contenders, that’s a huge chunk of change.
They may be meaning for the House. I know that quite a few Senate races have had more spent (Michael Huffington spent around $28 million in 1994, Jon Corzine around $60 million in 2000).
And if I can ask a related question that I’ve been wondering about since Perot’s run, is any part of a candidate’s spending of his personal funds tax deductible? In other words, are we taxpayers subsidizing these millionaires’ vanity?
Depends on how they do it.
A donation to a political campaign, even your own, is not deductible under IRS rules.
But a loan to a campaign that is not paid back is treated like any other kind of bad loan, and can be written off against your income for that year. Which is why you often see candidates loaning money to their campaign committee, rather than donating it.