By Adam Pagnucco.
Recently, we have run several reports on fundraising through January 2018. This post combines all of our data and presents the top 20 fundraisers in MoCo so far. Note that we break out self-financing and report totals raised for the cycle, not just totals since the last report. And… here they are!
A few random thoughts.
1. It’s natural to expect Brian Frosh and Peter Franchot to be the leaders since they both hold statewide offices. Of the county-level candidates, Council Member Roger Berliner, who is running for Executive, is number one.
2. The numbers for Senator Rich Madaleno (D-18), who is running for Governor, are misleading since he will be applying for public matching funds. Madaleno has said that he anticipates receiving about $975,000 from the state.
3. Delegate Jeff Waldstreicher (D-18), who is running for Senate, is the leading fundraiser among all of MoCo’s state legislators. He will need that money against his self-funding rival, Dana Beyer.
4. County Executive candidate David Blair, gubernatorial candidate Krish Vignarajah, Council District 1 candidate Andrew Friedson and Council At-Large candidate Bill Conway are first-time candidates. It’s a significant achievement for first-timers to make a list of this kind although it’s somewhat tempered by the self-financing of Blair and Vignarajah.
5. Delegate Marc Korman (D-16) is the only first-term elected official on this list. That’s a big deal and a sign of good things to come.
6. Council Member Marc Elrich, who is running for Executive, has never been on a top fundraising list in his life. He is now, and that’s thanks to public financing.
7. Lieutenant Governor candidate Susan Turnbull raised more money in a month and a half of campaigning than half the people on this list did in the entire cycle, a staggering feat.
8. Governor Larry Hogan has raised more money this cycle ($11.5 million) than everyone on this list combined.
Note: an earlier version of this post mistakenly omitted Turnbull’s results. We have corrected it to include her.