House Ways and Means Chairman Charles B. Rangel had a stellar second quarter in the money chase, raising $1.25 million.

That was tops among House members and candidates and enough to push Rangel’s $2.1 million total for 2007 past his fundraising haul for the entire 2005-06 election cycle, according to CQ’s Political Moneyline.

Rangel, D-N.Y., even collected from an unexpected source: the co-founders of The Blackstone Group, the private equity firm whose tax practices are now under lawmakers’ microscopes. Stephen Schwarzman and Peter G. Peterson each gave Rangel $1,000 on June 5.

Since the beginning of 1999, Schwarzman and Peterson have given about $300,000 to Republican candidates and causes, compared with less than $60,000 to Democrats.

Not a dime went to Rangel — until now.

The money doesn’t seem to have won him over, though. Two weeks after the contribution, Rangel cosponsored a bill (HR 2834) that would force Schwarzman, Peterson and every other private equity manager to pay ordinary income tax rates of 35 percent on most of their earnings, as opposed to the 15 percent capital gains rate they pay now.