Statewide Democrats outraise Republicans across the board
The Q3 campaign finance reports filed on October 15 show Democrats leading the way financially from the governor's race to Arizona superintendent.
Every single Democrat running for statewide office in Arizona outraised their GOP opponent between July and September, campaign finance reports show. It’s the first time this has happened.
It’s a good momentum swing for the Democrats where they can use all the help they can get as voting continues through November 8 and polling shows every race will likely be margin of error thin.
Of course, as we witnessed with Karrin Taylor Robson burning away $22 million –– more than $18 million she loaned herself –– money alone does not win you an election. So how the candidates are campaigning in the final stretch and also how they choose to spend the money will be keys to victory next month.
This week in Fourth Estate 48 will be a special week dedicated to campaign finances and today’s will only focus on the races for: governor, secretary of state, attorney general, treasurer, superintendent of public instruction and all the outside money for those races.
The rest of the week will hit on: competitive federal races (U.S. Senate, CD1, CD2, CD4 and CD6), competitive legislative races (LD2, LD4, LD9, LD13 and LD16), Maricopa County Attorney, some municipal races, school boards and more. If you want to see a specific race covered by me, let me know and I’ll be happy to oblige.
Governor
Both Democrat Katie Hobbs and Republican Kari Lake are setting fundraising records for statewide races in Arizona, but over the past three months Hobbs outraised Lake by roughly $2 million –– a truly impressive haul.
Hobbs raised $5.3 million for the quarter, bringing her overall total to $10.25 million; she spent $4.4 million between July and September and was left with $1.7 million in her war chest to start October and the final stretch to Election Day. Hobbs in total has spent 84% of what she’s raised since her campaign launched last year.
Lake raised roughly $3.5 million over the same time, giving her an overall total of $7.4 million (by comparison Gov. Doug Ducey held the fundraising record with just more than $6 million for the entire 2018 cycle). Lake –– and Hobbs –– still have three months to go before filing their final reports.
In terms of spending, Lake is burning less than Hobbs. Her burn rate was 75% overall and spent roughly $2 million for the quarter. Lake’s spending habits have been questioned often given her proclivity for dining out and using campaign funds to buy boots or travel to Mar-A-Lago. She once again dined out a lot this quarter at an average of two transactions per day over the 90-day period.1
Lake did have more on hand than Hobbs heading into October, but not by much. She was left with $1.8 million to spend.
Hobbs’ average contribution was $88 and received $2.6 million of her quarter total from Arizonans or 49%.
Lake’s average was $106 and she received $2.2 million from Arizonans or 63%.
Outside spending
Hobbs may have dwarfed Lake’s finances over the quarter, but Lake is still the beneficiary of the Ducey-led Republican Governors’ Association spending roughly $6 million in anti-Hobbs ads. The RGA has not given a dime in independent expenditures to support Lake. The RGA did spend to support Ducey in 2018, but not nearly as much as the $8 million that went toward defeating David Garcia.
Lake has also benefitted from the NRA’s PAC and American Focus PAC, among others.
American Focus PAC received the bulk of its money from Arizona Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill ($25,000), APS CEO Jeff Guldner ($25,000) and GoDaddy founder and billionaire Bob Parsons ($100,000). The PAC spent roughly $450,000 to support Lake’s candidacy, but all of that welled up after the August 2 primary. What’s interesting is the American Focus PAC previously backed Karrin Taylor Robson in the primary and spent to defeat Lake, but days after running an ad attacking Lake it began to back her.
The groups spending to defeat Lake are mostly made up of Everytown for Gun Safety Victory Fund, Republican Accountability PAC and Planned Parenthood, among others. In total groups spent $3.5 million to defeat Lake including primary numbers.
Hobbs hasn’t received much in the support of independent expenditures, but looking at other filings show the Democratic Governors Association put in more than $5 million to the Arizona Democratic Party and that money is being used to support Hobbs and defeat Lake.
Secretary of State
Democrat Adrian Fontes crushed Republican Mark Finchem for the quarter, outraising the fake cowboy by roughly $1 million for a race that has never seen this much money come in during a cycle.
Fontes brought in $1.7 million to Finchem’s $592,000.
Fontes received $25 from Finchem’s estranged son Ben who lives in Michigan, and it’s not the first time his son has worked to defeat his father several states away.
Finchem reacted to Fontes’ Q3 haul the only way he knew how –– repeating his George Soros antisemitic dog whistle. “Yes I do need funds because I have to compete with Soros dark money,” he tweeted.
Let’s be clear: Soros gave Fontes $5,000 in 2021 as did his son Alex Soros. Fontes has raised nearly $2.5 million to date. The Soros family makes up 0.41% of his entire campaign coffers.
Fontes also heavily outspent Finchem $994,000 to $353,000. Finchem spent 70% of that total on consulting from Go Right Strategies, the Florida firm owned by Spencer Rogers, the nephew of Wendy. In total Finchem spent $1 million for Rogers’s services.
Fontes has almost twice as much cash on hand heading into the final stretch. He was sitting on $745,000 in his war chest compared to Finchem’s $385,000. All of this is good news for Fontes’ campaign.
During the primary, Fontes’ opponent House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding faced accusations of violating state campaign finance law for possibly colluding with his non profit’s campaign arm Our Voice Our Vote who gave heavily in independent expenditures to Bolding’s campaign. Since Bolding lost the primary he has not spent a single cent through the “dark money” PAC in favor of Fontes’ campaign. The group has however given money to Hobbs, Attorney General candidate Kris Mayes and Maricopa County Attorney candidate Julie Gunnigle.
Outside spending
Fontes has received a modest $400,000 in outside spending on his behalf compared to $58,000 against, but that was all during the primary. There’s been more than $2 million in ie’s spent to defeat Finchem, but most of that came in January and February from MoveOn Political Action.
Attorney General
Democrat Kris Mayes continues the trend of Dems outraising their Republican opponents. She raised $1.2 million in Q3, which bests her GOP counterpart Abe Hamadeh $731,000. Hamadeh’s haul is really $576,000 considering he relied on the deep pockets of his family to loan him another $155,000 over the past three months.
His total loan amount this cycle is $745,000, but this doesn’t include the $1 million his brother and campaign chairman loaned him in order to receive Trump’s endorsement which he immediately paid back but conveniently after the Q1 period ended so it wouldn’t appear on a report for another three months.
Hamadeh’s loans this time came in July, so nothing seems nefarious here and he appears to have spent most of the money.
Mayes also outspent Hamadeh by more than $1 million. She burned through $1.4 million in the quarter to Hamadeh’s $387,000, but that’s not surprising given Hamadeh only entered the quarter with $14,000 and Mayes didn’t need to spend much in the primary since her two opponents dropped out early in the race.
Heading into October Mayes had $447,000 on hand compared to Hamadeh’s $417,000.
Some notable names gave Hamadeh money this quarter.
Pinnacle West (APS parent company) CFO Ted Geisler contributed $2,500; Brandon Rafi of Rafi Law Group fame gave Hamadeh the max $5,300; Don Brandt, the former CEO of APS, gave the max; former CD1 Republican candidate Elijah Norton, and former U.S. Attorney of Arizona and Mark Brnovich’s former chief of staff Mike Bailey also contributed to Hamadeh’s campaign. As did the GEO Group, the prominent private prison company.
Outside spending
Hamadeh has benefitted greatly from the Republican Attorneys General Association (or RAGA) a group that has come under fire for sending out robocalls encouraging people to attend the January 6 rally-turned-riot in D.C. Hamadeh has, perhaps coincidentally, surrounded himself with people associated with January 6 or the Stop the Steal movement or fake electors. $860,000 has been spent to support Hamadeh compared to $760,000 against.
Mayes hasn’t seen much support in outside spending and the Democratic Attorneys General Association’s PAC is nowhere to be found locally.2 $45,000 has gone to support Mayes ($25,000 from Bolding's PAC) and $1.4 million opposing her.
Treasurer and Superintendent
These two statewide races are not going to see a lot of money and they have not thus far. Incumbent Treasurer Kimberly Yee, a Republican, has not raised much since she dropped out of the governor’s race in January and State Sen. Martin Quezada, her Democratic opponent outraised her this quarter $81,000 to $57,000. Yee still has $170,000 on hand headed into October compared to Quezada’s $58,000.
Only Quezada has seen outside money on his behalf –– a whopping $88 from the Saddlebrooke Democratic Club. No outside money spent in opposition to either candidate.
Kathy Hoffman, the Democratic incumbent for Superintendent, is the only statewide candidate running with Clean Elections funding, but she’s still raised more than former Superintendent and Attorney General Tom Horne who is relying on his own pockets to take down the popular Dem.
Hoffman’s Clean Elections funding brought her $166,000 compared to Horne’s $130,000. Horne has loaned himself $700,000 (also including family contributions) this election cycle. He did receive $1,500 from former Phoenix Suns owner Jerry Colangelo and $150 from election-denying attorney-for-hire Tim LaSota, among notable contributors.
Hoffman has received $12,000 in outside spending help, nothing in opposition and nothing for Horne.
Horne did officially repay David Stringer, the child molester and friend of Horne who the candidate doubled down to support until he finally didn’t.
To look at all reports, hit the link and search for candidates.
I have not added up how much she’s spent in total on food, but by the end of June it was tens of thousands of dollars worth, well more than any other candidate.
Nothing to the Arizona Democratic Party either. It’s possible they name it something weird, so if you know something I don’t let me know!