Gov. Tim PawlentyGov. Tim Pawlenty finished 2008 with nearly $600,000 in the bank — a conspicuously large war chest considering he’s not running for re-election. So what will become of the money contributed to his gubernatorial campaign committee? And more importantly, can he utilize that money for a presidential bid?

The answer is yes — and no.

“There’s no such thing as a straightforward question in this area of law,” says Joseph Birkenstock, an attorney with the Washington law firm of Caplin & Drysdale, who specializes in campaign finance law.

Indeed MnIndy’s efforts to answer this question initially yielded conflicting expert opinions.

Richard Briffault, a professor at Columbia University Law School, said Pawlenty could use the money for a presidential bid.

“There would be no general problem with shifting money from one campaign to the other if the money satisfies the legal requirements of the second campaign,” Briffault said.

But Rick Hasen, a professor at Loyola Law School and author of the Election Law blog, initially disputed that assertion.

“There are certain rules that apply to the raising of money in federal elections that don’t apply to state elections,” he noted.

So who’s right? They both are. Simply transferring the money to a new campaign committee is not an option. That would violate federal law.

“That money’s really verboten until he works it into a new federal committee,” says Birkenstock.

As that statement suggests, there is an intriguing potential end-run around this prohibition for Pawlenty. He could return the money to the donors, while at the same time soliciting a contribution for his presidential bid. Donors would then have the option of committing the funds to the new federal committee. Federal Election Commission regulations explicitly allow for such a transaction.

But there’s another potential sticking point for Pawlenty: The contributions must have been collected in adherence with federal campaign finance laws. Most notably, individual contributions can’t exceed $2,300, and corporate donations are banned.

This isn’t likely to be a significant hurdle, however. Under Minnesota’s campaign finance laws, donors are  limited to giving $500 in non-election years and can contribute up to $2,000 in election years. So theoretically they could give up to $3,500 during a four-year election cycle. In those instances, donors could simply hold on to any contributions that exceed $2,300.

Of course there’s no guarantee that donors would choose to funnel the money into Pawlenty’s presidential campaign. “They can keep the whole thing,” notes Birkenstock.

There’s also, of course, no guarantee Pawlenty will run for president.