Looking at the money in LD13, LD16 and MCAO
The County Attorney race is even razor thin financially and the final two competitive LD races show similar trends of Dems leading the way, but not by much.
Democrats are outraising their Republican opponents with few exceptions in close races. All statewide Dems were winning the money battle, and save for one House Republican candidate, Dems raised more than the GOP in the three competitive races covered in yesterday’s post.
How that will transfer to votes is key. Remember, Democrats in 2020 were backed by millions upon millions of dollars in outside spending on top of high fundraising totals for their personal campaign accounts and Dems ended up net losing one seat in the Legislature.
Money isn’t everything, but it’s the topic I am covering this week so here are the candidates for LD13, LD16 and Maricopa County Attorney’s Office. It’s the final two competitive legislative races and a special election to hold the prosecuting agency for two years.
Legislative District 13
State Sen. JD Mesnard is a pretty prolific fundraiser, but also typically one of the biggest beneficiaries –– and targets –– of outside spending.
He’s overcome challenge after challenge in his purplish Chandler district (formerly LD17) and this year he faces the closest electorate to date.
He’s trailing his Democratic opponent for LD13 Senate, Cynthia Hans, by about $40,000 for Q3.
Mesnard raised $96,000 for the period; Hans raised $133,000. His spending was small, likely to spend big while voters have their ballots at home. He only spent $13,000 to Hans’ $66,000, but Mesnard is sitting on a $182,000 war chest headed into the final weeks of the cycle.
Hans was left with a respectable $73,000.
Mesnard is also the biggest recipient of PAC money coming from groups like several Chambers of Commerce, realtors, the private prison lobby, public utilities and more. It’s made up 45% of his overall haul. By comparison, Hans’s PAC share is about 32% of her total.
For the LD13 House: Jennifer Pawlik, an LD17 House Democrat, is raising a similar amount of money to Mesnard and from similar PACs as well. She’s raised some money from the Greater Phoenix Chamber and the public utilities among others, including national progressive groups that want Dem majorities in state houses.
Pawlik raised $81,000 for the quarter, spent $45,000 and sits on $120,000 left to spend.
Her two Republican opponents fall short of all three areas.
Julie Willoughby raised just about $22,000 for the quarter and to date has loaned herself more than $40,000. She spent almost $6,000 and has roughly $60,000 left to spend. Her loans would be the most among the five competitive LDs if not for her fellow GOP candidate for LD13 House.
Liz Harris is severely struggling to raise money this cycle. She loaned herself $50,000 and has only raised $14,000 from individual contributors. This quarter she only brought in $7,800, spent $3,000 and still has $58,000 left to spend. Maybe the highly competitive LD13 is ready to reject one of the biggest election deniers running for a legislative race this year. (She lost in the LD17 race in 2020 to Pawlik and outgoing State Rep. Jeff Weninger.)
Despite her background, APS parent company Pinnacle West still gave her $500 and the GEO Group contributed $1,000, but other special interest groups opted to back Willoughby and not Harris in the district.
Legislative District 16
This district is only competitive on paper, and the campaign finance totals only make that more clear.
I don’t think anybody actually expected GOP State Sen. TJ Shope to lose his senate race to Dem challenger Taylor Kerby, but Kerby also isn’t raising anything and literally did not spend a single dollar between July through September which doesn’t spell a winning strategy. Though, weirder things have happened.
Shope brought in $35,000 for the quarter, spent about $13,000 and had $130,000 left to spend, but some of it went to this recent ad he put out.
Kerby raised $28,000 over the past three months, spent $0.00 and was sitting on roughly $45,000 down the final stretch.
Shope is backed heavily by PACs (more than Mesnard) with $86,650 during the cycle. It comes from the usual suspects, as the other Republican legislative candidates have seen.
For the three candidates running for two House seats in LD16, Democrat Keith Seaman leads the way with $41,000 in Q3. He’s ahead of the two Republicans State Rep. Teresa Martinez, who was appointed to the position in November after Bret Roberts resigned, and Rob Hudelson.
Martinez raised $31,000 with $18,000 coming from PACs and businesses. Her largest PAC contribution was from the AZ Professional Firefighter PAC, but she still received money from the utilities and other groups her fellow Republicans have benefitted from.
Hudelson only raised $23,000 and spent $13,000 which is more than Martinez’s $10,000 disbursements, but less than Seaman’s $47,000.
On hand, Martinez sits on the most cash with $51,000 to spend, followed by Seaman’s $21,000 and Hudelson’s $10,000.
Maricopa County Attorney
This is the only competitive countywide race this cycle, since it’s a special election and county races usually line up with the presidential election cycle.1
Democrat Julie Gunnigle, who previously lost in this race to Allister Adel in 2020, is taking on another appointed incumbent in Rachel Mitchell, her first political race.2
The campaigns fundraising totals are neck-and-neck like the race is expected to be.
Gunnigle leads the way by a razor-thin margin. She raised $174,867 for the quarter; Mitchell raised $172,473. That brings their cumulative totals to: $420,000 for Gunnigle and $416,000 for Mitchell.
Gunnigle spent more than Mitchell, but also didn’t have to spend much during the primary since she was uncontested whereas Mitchell faced Gina Godbehere and won pretty handily. Gunnigle spent $107,000 for the quarter to Mitchell’s $63,000.
Because of the primary situation, Gunnigle is left on hand with $234,000, while Mitchell is left with $175,000.
Looking deeper at the numbers, Gunnigle is outraising Mitchell three-to-one from non Arizonans ($22,000 to $7,500), but Mitchell leads the way with PAC support by a nearly seven-to-one margin ($20,500 to $3,000).
There is a Board of Supervisors race in District 2, but it’s just Republican Thomas Galvin who handily won in his special election primary against three election denying MAGA Republicans; and Jeff Fine will win his uncontested race for County Clerk.
It’s really refreshing watching a race unfold in 2022 that doesn’t have to talk about the 2020 election because Mitchell smartly put that to bed immediately when asked during the appointment process in April. If voters have been paying attention, each candidate has been pretty clear where they stand on the issues of the MCAO.