The mainstream press and political insiders are obsessed — obsessed — with how much money candidates raise. Money is one metric that shows momentum and how much grassroots support a candidate has.
Which is why there was some hullabaloo Monday around second quarter finances in the Democratic presidential primary.
As for the two Texans in the race, Beto O’Rourke raked in $3.6 million and Julián Castro $2.8 million. By comparison, during the same time period:
- Joe Biden: $21.5 million
- Pete Buttigieg: $24.8 million
- Elizabeth Warren: $19 million
- Bernie Sanders: $18 million
- Kamala Harris: $12 million (approx.)
Like polls, fundraising goes up and down. And like polls, money raised is a snapshot in time.
O’Rourke campaign manager, Jen O’Malley Dillon, cautioned after the release of their numbers that her candidate has continually been underestimated in his career.
Castro’s second quarter haul was an impressive improvement over his $1.1 million during the first quarter.
But perhaps the more interesting — longer lasting— story on Monday was a memo from the O’Rourke campaign. Their path to victory includes Iowa and Texas, the latter of which, the memo stated, has “the third most delegates of any state in the country, and we’re in the best position to win it.”
Few, if any, presidential candidates are talking about Texas as part of the larger strategy to win the White House. It is a swing state this cycle, after all.
