By Adam Pagnucco.
Part One discussed issues with campaign finance data from the State Board of Elections (SBE). Part Two described differences between the traditional financing system used by Council Member Andrew Friedson and the public financing system used by Council Members Evan Glass and Will Jawando. Now let’s get into the numbers.
The first number is an important one: $550,751. That’s the cash balance reported by Friedson after the 2022 general election. Friedson had that money because he had no opponent in seeking his second term on the council. He has wisely used that time to build up a hulking war chest that he will now use in his race for executive. Meanwhile, Glass and Jawando started with close to zero. (Jawando has an asterisk that we will return to later.)
Here is the second set of numbers: receipts for the cycle. The state is defining the current cycle as including the 2023 annual report, which begins on 11/16/22. I have not previously defined a cycle as starting that early, but for the sake of consistency with SBE data (such at is), I’ll go with it. It has no effect on the numbers for Glass and Jawando. Friedson raised $80,002 during that period, so it has a minimal impact on his numbers.
The chart below shows two sets of receipts. The dark green bar shows the raw total for the cycle. The light green bar shows pending public matching funds requests by Glass and Jawando. It’s fair to include that money in their take because they have already earned it (or something close to it) through their collection of contributions from in-county residents.
Friedson has received $1,671,617 since the last general election. When combining their actual receipts with their pending public matching funds requests, Jawando is due to receive $717,938 and Glass is due to receive $673,125. That’s an advantage for Friedson but not as large as the advantage David Blair had over County Executive Marc Elrich in the last cycle. (Blair and an anti-Elrich Super PAC outspent Elrich by close to seven to one.)
Now let’s look at expenditures for the cycle.
Friedson has spent the most money so far but he has also raised the most. Jawando has raised slightly more money than Glass but he has spent more than twice as much as Glass. We will get into why that is later in the series.
Let’s finish with cash balance. As with the receipts chart above, this one shows both raw cash on hand and the amounts of pending matching funds requests by Glass and Jawando. Since they will receive those matching funds (or close to it) in a matter of weeks, it’s fair to include them in their cash positions.
Including public matching funds requests, here are the cash balances for the candidates.
Friedson: $1,847,407
Glass: $610,815
Jawando: $576,656
So the bottom line here is that Friedson has outraised his competitors while Glass and Jawando are close to each other. None of this is a surprise.
We will get into where this money is coming from next.