On the ballot next year will be Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who could have a particularly difficult time politically given the partisan lean of his state, which went to Trump by over 16 percent in 2020! Tester, though, is starting out from a solid place, with a newly reported fundraising haul across the second quarter of $5 million.
Among the Republicans to have already expressed interest in challenging Tester are Matt Rosendale and Austin Knudsen, both of whom currently hold government positions in the western state. Rosendale is a Congressman in what’s now the 2nd district, while Knudsen is the state attorney general. Rosendale’s total receipts in the first quarter of this year were, quite simply, far under the millions that Tester raised in the second quarter, though the pace would presumably quicken if Matt ran for Senate. The Rosendale House campaign reported accumulating just $127,000 across those months, from January 1 to March’s end.
Tester’s total fundraising for the second quarter is just behind the total for that same period raised by Texas Democrat Colin Allred, a Congressman hoping to unseat Ted Cruz in the Senate. (Allred approached $6.2 million, finishing with an overall total far above that level because of millions more that were transferred from his House campaign.) Allred’s and Tester’s numbers were both, though, far ahead of — for comparison’s sake — the total raised in the first quarter by Cruz himself. (Some Democratic fundraising numbers for the second quarter began to circulate before GOP figures, making some of these comparisons across different periods.)
Across the map of Senate elections that will be taking place in 2024, Democrats could end up with a particularly tough time, considering seats in Ohio, Nevada, West Virginia, and similarly leaning states will be contested. Biden narrowly won Nevada in 2020, but the others favored Trump. In the House, Democratic contender Adam Frisch posted a massive fundraising haul for the second quarter amid his attempt to unseat infamous Republican Lauren Boebert, who despite her vitriol only saw her district go for Trump by single digits in 2020. (Marjorie Taylor Greene has more wiggle room, considering her district went for Donald by nearly 50 percent in the 2020 presidential race.) Frisch’s quarterly fundraising passed $2.6 million.
