Politics

Democrats post early fundraising edge in marquee 2026 Senate races

Published

7 months ago

February 1, 2026

One bright spot for Democrats as they face a tough path to taking back the Senate this year: Their candidates are raising a lot of money.

Democrats outraised their GOP counterparts across several of this year’s marquee Senate races heading into 2026, according to new filings submitted to the Federal Election Commission on Saturday.

Sen. Jon Ossoff, the only Democrat running for reelection in a state Donald Trump won, enters the year with a massive fundraising advantage over any of his GOP rivals in battleground Georgia. Democrats in North Carolina and Ohio also started the year with a major financial edge over their GOP rivals.

But heated Democratic primaries have helped Republicans maintain a cash advantage in a few key states, including Michigan, Maine and Iowa.

Strong fundraising will be critical to Democrats’ efforts to hold all their seats — including several that are open following battleground senators’ retirements — while also flipping four Republican ones.

In a handful of primaries, including the Democratic contests in Michigan and Texas and the Republican lineup in Georgia, fourth-quarter fundraising numbers largely did not show any one candidate majorly distinguishing themselves from the rest.

Here’s a rundown of what the fundraising looked like in key Senate races.

Georgia

Ossoff holds a significant fundraising advantage over his Republican opponents duking it out in the primary. He raised $9.9 million in the final quarter of 2025 and ended the year with $25.5 million in his war chest — numbers that are substantially higher than all of his GOP rivals combined.

Georgia Rep. Buddy Carter brought in the most in the GOP primary, raising $1.7 million and entering 2026 with $4.1 million cash on hand. Ex-football coach Derek Dooley reported raising $1.1 million, while Rep. Mike Collins raised just shy of $825,000. Dooley ended the quarter with $2.1 million left in the bank, while Collins reported having $2.3 million.

While Ossoff holds a massive fundraising advantage, the gap is likely to shrink when the Republican nominee is selected in May and the party, including its donors, coalesces around one candidate.

North Carolina

Democratic former governor Roy Cooper maintains a fundraising advantage in North Carolina over former Republican National Committee Chair Michael Whatley.

Cooper broke fundraising records when he launched his campaign and has continued to bring in large sums, raising $7 million from October through December last year, according to his filings with the FEC — nearly double the $3.8 million Whatley raised during the same period. Cooper entered 2026 with $12.3 million in his campaign coffers, a sizable haul that will be necessary as he prepares for November.

Whatley, who has been endorsed by Trump, ended the fourth quarter with $3.7 million in cash on hand. Both candidates — the likely nominees in the state’s Senate race — bring extensive donor networks from their prior roles, setting up North Carolina to be one of the most expensive contests this cycle.

Operatives in both parties say spending could reach $650 million to $800 million. Democrats are eying the North Carolina seat, left open by the retirement of GOP Sen. Thom Tillis, as one of their best pick up opportunities in November.

Michigan

In Michigan, Democrats are looking to hold retiring Sen. Gary Peters’ seat, but three Democratic front-runners are locked in a tight race, and their fundraising reflects it.

Rep. Haley Stevens holds an early fundraising advantage, raising $2.1 million during the fourth quarter of 2025 and entered the year with roughly $3 million in the bank. Widely seen as the establishment candidate in the contentious primary, Stevens benefits from being able to tap into her existing donor networks, but her opponents are not far behind. State Sen. Mallory McMorrow and physician Abdul El-Sayed each raised roughly $1.7 million and ended the year with around $1.9 million in the bank.

With Michigan’s Aug. 4 primary — later than most states — the Democratic candidates will need to sustain strong fundraising numbers through what is shaping up to be a long and expensive intraparty fight.

Former Rep. Mike Rogers, the frontrunner on the GOP side, raised $1.9 million and ended the fourth quarter with $3.5 million in cash on hand.

Rogers — the candidate most national Republicans have coalesced around — will benefit from being the main GOP candidate while Democrats get through their bruising primary. He also ran for the Senate in 2024, giving him a network of donors to tap into. The GOP is eying Michigan — where Trump won by just over a point in 2024 — as a top pickup opportunity in November.

Maine

Political newcomer and oysterman Graham Platner outraised both Gov. Janet Mills, his main Democratic rival, and incumbent Sen. Susan Collins, who is one of the party’s top targets as the only GOP senator representing a state won by Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024.

Platner raised $4.6 million in the fourth quarter compared to $2.2 million for Collins and $2.7 million for Mills, who launched her campaign in mid-October.

But Collins, who has not formally launched her campaign yet, sits on far more cash than both her Democratic rivals, with a little over $8 million in the bank compared to $3.7 million for Platner and $1.3 million for Mills.

Ohio

Former Sen. Sherrod Brown significantly outraised Sen. Jon Husted in the fourth quarter, giving Democrats a boost in their longshot bid to flip the Senate seat in the state that has turned increasingly red. Brown raised $7.3 million, while Husted — appointed last year to fill the seat vacated by JD Vance becoming vice president — raised $1.5 million.

Brown, a prolific fundraiser, began 2026 with $9.9 million in his war chest. He is expected to need deep reserves again, after cryptocurrency-linked groups spent heavily against him during his unsuccessful 2024 reelection bid. Husted started the year with just under $6 million.

New Hampshire

In New Hampshire, Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas continued to comfortably outraise his Republican competition in the race to replace retiring Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen. Pappas brought in $2.3 million in the fourth quarter and ended 2025 with $3.2 million cash on hand.

Former Sen. John Sununu, who was defeated by Shaheen in 2008 and is running with the backing of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, raised $1.3 million and had $1.1 million cash on hand. His Republican primary rival Scott Brown, who briefly represented neighboring Massachusetts in the Senate, raised just $374,000 and had $907,000 in the bank.

Texas

Money is flowing into the Democratic primary in Texas, where Rep. Jasmine Crockett and state Rep. James Talarico both raised over $6 million during the fourth quarter.

Crockett, who launched her Senate campaign in early December, raised $2 million from donors through the end of the month and transferred another $4.5 million from her previous House campaign account. But Talarico, a state representative from Austin, outraised Crockett and ended the year with more money in the bank. He started 2026 with $7.1 million in his war chest, compared to $5.6 million for the Dallas-area representative.

Both candidates outraised the Republican field by a wide margin. On the GOP side, state Attorney General Ken Paxton raked in $1.1 million, while incumbent Sen. John Cornyn raised $1 million for his campaign and another $4.1 million through a joint fundraising committee that has been running TV ads on his behalf. Rep. Wesley Hunt, polling in third in the GOP primary, raised just over $429,000.

Cornyn — whose reelection bid has been endorsed by the NRSC — still maintains a huge cash on hand advantage. He has more than $10 million in the bank between his campaign account and joint fundraising committee, a war chest that could prove pivotal in the final stretch of the March 3 primary — or an extended runoff . He is locked in a neck and neck race with Paxton.

Paxton entered 2026 with $3.7 million in the bank. Hunt had $778,660.

Iowa

Democrats duking it out in Iowa’s Senate primary posted modest fundraising hauls in the fourth quarter. State Rep. Josh Turek raised $677,000, while state Sen. Zach Wahls brought in $741,000. Nathan Sage, the third Democrat viewed as competitive for the nomination, brought in $229,000.

Wahls also entered 2026 with the cash on hand advantage. He had $733,000 left in his war chest, while Turek had just shy of $400,000. Sage had $86,000 in the bank at the start of the year.

Whichever Democrats wins will need serious money to try flipping the seat left open by retiring Sen. Joni Ernst.

Rep. Ashley Hinson brought in $1.6 million and had nearly $5.2 million in the bank at the end of 2025, a substantial fundraising advantage over all of her potential Democratic opponents.

Politics

Texas Republicans denounce GOP statewide candidate over xenophobic post

Published

5 hours ago

September 13, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Prominent Texas Republicans are denouncing Bo French, a Republican nominee to join the state’s railroad commission, after he made a xenophobic post describing a group of Asian American students attending a University of Texas football game as a “problem.”

French posted a photo on X of UT students celebrating in the crowd and wrote: “I heard UT graduation this year looked like this. I didn’t believe it. The problem is now obviously far worse than anyone imagined.”

Sen. John Cornyn immediately condemned the post as racist and called on other Republican officials to speak out.

“This is the Republican nominee for statewide office,” Cornyn wrote on X. “Are other Republican elected officials going to condemn the intolerance and racism, or look the other way while it becomes normalized. This is how great political parties self-destruct. Sad.”

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott also rejected French’s message in a statement shared with Blue Light News, saying the picture instead showed Texans united behind their college football team, which had just defeated top-ranked Ohio State.

“That is not my message,” Abbott said. “A selective picture of Longhorn fans celebrating our biggest home victory-ever-actually shows a way that Texans unite. We all support our college football teams.”

“The way we win the state is the same way we win football games,” Abbott added. “We unite under the brand of Texas.”

Abbott also defended Texas’ hard-line immigration policies, saying unity “doesn’t mean that Texas cannot also lead in having the toughest immigration laws of any state in America and freezing H1B visas at our universities.”

Several Republican members of the Texas House also joined in the backlash. State Rep. Lacey Hull urged French to remove the post, writing: “This post breaks my heart. I see college kids cheering on their football team. I see Texans.”

State Rep. Jared Patterson called the post “racist” and said it demeaned students because of their race or ethnicity.

“There is absolutely nothing Christian or conservative about looking at a crowd of young Texans at a college football game, seeing the color of their skin, and declaring that they are a ‘problem,’” Patterson wrote on X. “These are 20-year-old kids cheering for their university — not political props and not targets for racial attacks.”

Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows similarly wrote that opposing immigration policy does not justify “demeaning people because of their race or ethnicity,” adding that French’s post has “crossed the line” and should be deleted. State Rep. Jeff Leach offered a more succinct request: “Delete this, Bo.”

But French also drew support from some Republicans who attacked Cornyn for condemning him. Former Texas GOP Chair Matt Rinaldi accused Cornyn and other Republicans of mortgaging “our children’s future for government handouts and cheap labor,” while state Rep. Andy Hopper called Cornyn a “smug globalist” who had brought the policies at issue to Texas.

French has repeatedly engaged in inflammatory rhetoric. Earlier this year, he suggested Republicans should fear Islam and advocated for deporting 100 million people.

Representatives for French and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Politics

Obama calls for Dems to focus on AI

Published

11 hours ago

September 13, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Former President Barack Obama is urging Democrats — including 2028 presidential candidates and congressional leaders — to more aggressively focus on a comprehensive AI agenda, warning in a closed-door fundraiser that the technology is at an inflection point.

“This is something that is moving very fast in private hands, and if we don’t get on top of it, I think can be dangerous,” Obama said at the fundraiser Thursday, according to a partial transcript of his remarks provided by his office. “If we do get on top of it, I do think it’s beneficial.”

Speaking alongside House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries at the New-York Historical Society in Manhattan, Obama said he is neither a “doomer” nor an “accelerationist.” His remarks come amid increasing alarm over the technology’s advance, with executives at two of the country’s leading AI labs joining Elon Musk in calling for slowing its development, following months and years of cries from within the industry for government to act.

Obama said AI development would be “one of my central agendas” if he were running for president, throwing down a gauntlet as the shadow 2028 Democratic primary debate responded to the AI leaders’ calls.

“I would have a very clear plan, and I would talk about this, and I would say, here’s our plan for safety, here’s our plan for making sure our kids are not corrupted by this,” Obama said, according to excerpts of his remarks shared with Blue Light News by his office and first reportedby The New York Times.

Among the top concerns, Obama said: “I would be thinking about the economic impacts in very concrete ways and understanding what does it mean if there’s going to be job displacement. Where is that going to hit? How are we going to respond? Are there going to be limits to the amount of displacement that can take place? What is that going to mean for our social safety net? If it turns out that you’ve got a lot more people who can’t find full-time work because they’ve been rendered redundant, how are we going to respond?”

He also called for Congress to take action, telling Jeffries that Democrats should “put together a framework for a very public conversation” centered on the biggest issues.

Obama’s remarks mark a larger shift for both himself and the Democratic Party writ large: He governed as a tech-friendly Democrat, who broke POTUS tech barriers by having a laptop and iPad while in office and whose 2011 town hall at Facebook headquarters was widely seen as typifying the administration’s friendliness with Silicon Valley.

The Obama era was also known for Washington’s failure to confront the growing monopolization of power in the tech industry, most famously in the Federal Trade Commission’s 2013 decision not to file an antitrust lawsuit against Google. (The first Trump Justice Department later filed such a suit seven years later.)

Already on Sunday, at least two potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidates addressed the issue of slowing the pace of cutting-edge AI development, or otherwise keeping their products from launching pandemics or cyberattacks.

Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Democrats need to “address it head on.”

“There needs to be safeguards. There need to be rules. There need to be limits. There needs to be a kill switch on rogue AI,” Buttigieg said, criticizing congressional Republicans and the White House for not moving quicker to rein in AI development.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who has gone from courting AI investment to pumping the brakes on data center development, posted to X Sunday that it’s “long past time for our federal government to step up, take this seriously, and put up some guardrails — both here at home and on the global stage.”

The calls for “some guardrails” are still much milder than the proposals coming from the far left of the Democratic caucus, including the proposal by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) to pause the development of advanced AI models and permanently ban “artificial superintelligence.” And Obama’s remarks underscore the leadership vacuum in a Democratic Party that remains in the wilderness after brutal 2024 losses and continues to struggle to unify around a policy agenda.

In a portion of his remarks, Obama acknowledged the lack of high-level leadership on the AI issue, saying that “part of the job for us is to give people a reason to believe again in the idea of the democratic project, the American project, the economy that works for everyone, opportunity for every kid, to reassure people that if we work together, we can deliver those things. That’s hard to do without somebody in the White House to lead the charge, but I do think that people are ready for that message.”

President Donald Trump, meanwhile, has dismissed any worries about AI posing an existential threat, telling reporters last week that he’s mainly worried about beating China to dominate the technology.

Obama compared AI to other “dangerous technologies like nuclear power,” but added that it did not have the same “natural” and “physical constraints” on it that is not “under state control.”

In Congress, House and Senate lawmakers have sought to advance legislation to slow down or impose limits on AI development, so far without success. One key Senate proposal, led by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, faces an uncertain future because of differences over how to impose a legal duty on Silicon Valley companies that would hold them liable for harms their models cause. Another contentious issue is whether the legislation should preempt state from imposing their own AI laws.

House Speaker Mike Johnson said Sunday morning he would support talks with tech leaders on AI but insisted that developers — not Congress — are primarily responsible for ensuring their products are safe.

As lawmakers campaign in their districts ahead of the midterm elections, they are fighting to own the messaging as voters sour on data centers and the impact of AI systems on jobs and education, among other key areas.

Politics

GOP anxiety grows over North Carolina Senate race

Published

1 day ago

September 12, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

DALLAS — Republicans are increasingly worried that North Carolina’s Senate race is slipping out of contention.

For months, they had argued that a post-Labor Day infusion of cash could jolt new energy into the largely stagnant but critical Senate race. But as Republican nominee Michael Whatley struggles to meaningfully close the gap against Democrat Roy Cooper in the polls, some in the party fear they’re running out of time.

Republicans’ concerns were apparent in side conversations, closed-door meetings and even on-stage speeches at their splashy midterm convention in Dallas.

Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, a former National Republican Senatorial Committee chair, told Blue Light News that North Carolina was “probably one of the hardest” states on the map.

“You’re running against an existing governor,” Scott said of Cooper. “So that makes it harder in an open seat.”

One person, granted anonymity to discuss a private lunch they attended with Senate Majority Leader John Thune and the Senate Leadership Fund on the second day of the convention, similarly described the North Carolina race as “tough.” The lunch was focused on the party’s battleground Senate map, and Thune zeroed in on Alaska, Maine and Michigan as top targets.

“North Carolina and Georgia are seen by most as off the map at this point, and with Michigan and New Hampshire becoming real flip opportunities as we get closer to November, it’s becoming even more challenging to justify spending in North Carolina and Georgia,” said one GOP pollster who was in Dallas for the convention and, like others in this article, was granted anonymity to speak candidly.

Public polling has consistently shown Cooper ahead, including a survey released Thursday that found the Democrat leading Whatley by 11 points among likely voters.

Even President Donald Trump appeared to acknowledge the challenge: “Now in North Carolina, you have a little more difficult case, because people don’t quite get it, but they’re going to find out,” he said during his speech on the first night of the convention, while reiterating his support for Whatley, his former handpicked Republican National Committee chair.

The White House later announced that he will travel to Gastonia, North Carolina, for a campaign rally with Whatley next week. “The president’s first visit in the coming week is going to be helpful,” said a person close to the Whatley campaign. “Roy Cooper has maxed out his support and can’t grow anymore. But voters in NC, especially on the right, tune in late and break late. The Trump visit will be a good motivator for our voters.”

North Carolina’s Senate contest has been one of the more subdued races of the cycle, especially for a perennial battleground that could play a pivotal role in determining control of the upper chamber. That could change as more money pours in during the final stretch — and if Whatley can pick up more steam.

“Some in D.C. — [Republicans] and [Democrats] — have viewed North Carolina as typically a slam dunk for Republicans,” Doug Heye, a longtime GOP strategist who is from North Carolina. “But that just isn’t true, as tight presidential and senatorial margins have shown us time and again.”

SLF, the top Senate super PAC, has pledged an initial $71 million in North Carolina through Election Day, including an initial $17 million summer advertising campaign supporting Whatley. No Going Back PAC, which is affiliated with the president’s MAGA Inc. super PAC, dropped roughly $5 million into North Carolina earlier this week. But in a state that has some of the country’s most expensive media markets, both parties may ultimately need to spend substantially more.

Whatley was at the Dallas convention, where he attended an event hosted jointly by SLF and the NRSC discussing the battleground map. He also had a speaking slot.

Whatley told Blue Light News that he was confident his campaign was “going to have the resources that we need to get our message out and talk to the voters about the issues that they care about.” Asked about the prospect of an influx of support from MAGA Inc., Whatley said he would “wait and see how that entire universe is going to come.”

But some Republicans are questioning whether additional money is enough to change the race’s trajectory at this point.

“There is still time, but even with at least $100 million, [Whatley] would need a campaign team capable of turning that money into actual points,” said one North Carolina-based Republican operative.

And Whatley could run up against the overall difficult environment for the GOP, as the party needs to shore up Republicans in other expensive states — like Texas — that historically have not needed attention.

“We can’t allocate a limited amount of resources and energy to 10 Senate races and expect to do well. We should be over-indexing where we think we have an edge,” the GOP pollster told Blue Light News in Dallas.

The NRSC isn’t worried about Whatley’s current standing.

“Summer polling has flattered North Carolina Senate Democratic candidates before only to be proven wrong in November,” Bernadette Breslin, NRSC national press secretary, said in a statement. In 2020, polling at this point in the cycle showed GOP Sen. Thom Tillis trailing Cal Cunningham, the Democrat, before Tillis ultimately won by roughly two percentage points. Cunningham was also caught in a late-cycle scandal.

Democrats haven’t won a Senate race or carried North Carolina at the presidential level since 2008, though they’ve come close a few times. But it’s undeniable that Republicans’ struggle to address high costs of living — voters’ top concern heading into November — and Trump’s sagging approval ratings are putting Democrats in a strong position, both in North Carolina and other key battleground states.

“When you look at Republicans who won close races in the past, the setting and political environment aren’t the same,” said a national GOP operative who was also in Dallas for the convention.

“Sen. Tillis was elected in 2014, a wave year for Republicans,” the operative said. “Tillis won reelection in 2020 with Trump at the top of the ticket, and his opponent had a huge scandal. 2022 was an open seat [and] Ted Budd was a congressman. Dems gave up on the seat and didn’t put the money needed into the race to win.”

For their part, North Carolina Democrats aren’t relying on Cooper’s current wide polling advantage to hold. The Cooper campaign noted that the former governor’s lead is already narrowing.

The political dynamics of the state also make Democrats uneasy: North Carolina has backed the Republican presidential nominee in each of the last four elections, and Whatley could still benefit from an enormous influx of outside spending.

“A Democrat has not won statewide federal office here in nearly two decades — and Whatley’s elite D.C. connections mean Republicans are going to spend whatever it takes to keep this seat,” Jeff Allen, Cooper’s North Carolina campaign manager, said in a statement. “North Carolina is a 50-50 state and this will be a margin-of-error race, which is why we’re building a campaign to earn every vote and make sure North Carolinians know that Roy Cooper will fight for them, while Michael Whatley will continue to enrich himself at their expense.”

Still, for Republicans, the challenge goes beyond money. Motivating lower-propensity Republican voters — who are loyal to Trump but who may otherwise ignore a midterm election — is central to the party’s strategy. It was an overarching goal of the midterm convention as GOP lawmakers and Trump officials repeatedly warned of a democratic socialist takeover and focused on bread-and-butter issues for their base.

Paul Shumaker, a longtime North Carolina GOP operative and top consultant for Tillis, said Whatley is running up against two key hurdles that threaten to dog Republicans this cycle: GOP voters’ low enthusiasm and Trump’s sinking standing with unaffiliated voters.

“The President is underwater with unaffiliated voters, and Michael Whatley has to win a majority of those unaffiliated who turn out this election year,” said Shumaker, who is unaffiliated in the race. “Given North Carolina’s registration number and the fact that there is little to no crossover voting between the two major parties, fixing both problems is the only path to victory.”

Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.