By Alex Roarty
PoliticsPA Staff Writer
roarty@politicspa.com
If these numbers keep up, Tim Holden will have a huge early financial edge over any GOP foe in the fall.
The Democratic congressman raised $283,000 in the first fundraising quarter, documents filed with the FEC show, giving the incumbent nearly $850,000 on hand. He has raised almost $650,000 so far this election cycle.
The numbers dwarf those reported by any of his potential Republican foes, including likely GOP nominee Dave Argall. The Schuylkill County state senator raised $125,000 in the year’s first three months after declaring his candidacy in early January. He has about $100,000 on hand, which itself is far more than the man considered his main rival for the Republican nomination in the 17th Congressional District, Frank Ryan, who has about $34,000 available.
It’s also possible Argall will have to spend some of the money he has on hand to win the May 18 primary. He also faces Lebanon County resident Allen Griffith and Harrisburg man Josh First.
Holden is one of an array of Democratic incumbents in Pennsylvania considered vulnerable in the fall. The conservative “Blue Dog” Democrat, who voted against the Democratic health care bill twice, represents a a district that favored John McCain over Barack Obama in the 2008 election, by 3 percentage points.
But he must first contend with a primary challenge of his own, from Harrisburg resident Sheila Dow Ford. Holden’s effort to knock her off the ballot failed last week.
PoliticsPA rates the 17th District as the seventh most likely seat in Pennsylvania to change parties.
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Interesting. Holden has huge lead in PAC money; not so much in individual contributions. Wonder how the PAC money advantage will hold up once the general campaign begins, particularly given the mood of the country and the district.
There is no way Dave Argall has $100k on hand. He understated his obligations on his FEC form to stay above the $100k COH the hacks think is a magic number. It doesn’t include everything due his fundraiser, his campaign consultant and none of his polling, and it doesn’t include most of the value of the campaign materials he must have to influence voters. There’s also $10k in receipts unavailable for the primary. If he chased all the low hanging fruit to run up his numbers early as hacks like him generally do, he’s running dry by now. Betcha he’s close to broke.
Ryan’s a CPA. If he paid expenses as they were incurred or paid them forward, he’s running under the radar. Personal observation and that of others is that Ryan has a far better team, a tighter message and many more energized supporters. Argall better hadn’t start measuring a congressional office for drapes just yet.