(Ezekiel Loseke, Headline USA) Republican congressional candidates are out-fundraising Democrats in the districts expected to be competitive in the 2024 election.
The fundraising numbers are from the second quarter of 2023, as reported by Axios.
In seven of the 10 districts expected to be competitive, Republicans are leading the fundraising race.
Biden carried some of the hotly-contested districts in 2020. Six of the seven districts where Republicans are leading in fundraising were won by Biden.
Meanwhile, seven of the lowest eight fundraisers were Democrats, with scandal-plagued Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., being the lone Republican in the bottom eight.
Rep. Michelle Steel, R-Calif., was the best fundraiser of the group. She raised $763,000 between April and June.
Comparatively, the best Democratic fundraisers were more than $160,000 behind the leader. Rep. Marie Glyesnkam Perez, D-Wash., and Rep. Pat Ryan, D-N.Y., were the best fundraising Democrats, and each raised about $600,000.
The Democratic candidates, on average brought in $450,000. The Republicans, in contrast, averaged $560,000 raised.
In total, Democrats averaged an increase of $56,000. The Republicans, in contrast, averaged a $59,000 increase.
In addition to their own fundraising, these competitive Republicans got some help from Rep. Keven McCarthy, R-Calif. His fundraising organization, Protect The House 2024, gave many of these members between $100,000 and $225,000 transfers for Q2 of this year.
The fundraising trend runs counter to the reported polling, according to FiveThirtyEight, which reports that Democrats have a slight lead in polling going into August.
FiveThirtyEight reports Democrats have a slight edge in the last 10 polls taken, leading generic polling in six, whereas Republicans lead in four.
In this dataset the largest lead reported was for Republicans, who carried a six-point advantage in a poll released by OnMessage on July 10.
The largest Democratic lead reported was a four point advantage in a poll released by YouGov on Wednesday.
