AUSTIN, Texas _ U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas, raised a record-breaking $80.4 million in his 2018 U.S. Senate campaign, twice as much as was raised by U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, who defeated O'Rourke by 2.6 percentage points. It was one of the most hotly contested Senate races of the midterm elections and the closest statewide election in Texas in a generation of Republican hegemony.
According to his latest fundraising report, filed Thursday night, O'Rourke raised nearly $10.1 million between Oct. 18 and Nov. 26 _ the weeks leading up to and following his narrow loss to Cruz. O'Rourke's campaign did not take any political action committee money.
With refunds to some donors, including those who had exceeded the contribution limit or had foreign addresses, making them ineligible to donate, O'Rourke's net fundraising came in at $79.1 million. His campaign spent most of it, ending up with $477,000 in the bank as of the end of the filing period.
O'Rourke's eye-popping fundraising numbers for someone who began the race as a relatively unknown three-term congressman from El Paso are one of the reasons he is being seriously talked about as a Democratic presidential contender in what promises to be a large field for the 2020 nomination. O'Rourke, whose tenure in Congress is drawing to a close, has said he and his wife, Amy, are contemplating what he should do next, and has left the door open to a presidential candidacy.
Cruz's senatorial campaign committee raised nearly $4.8 million in the last period, surpassing the $34 million mark for the cycle. Cruz's campaign had $263,000 in the bank.
Those numbers were augmented by two other Cruz fundraising committees. The Ted Cruz Victory Committee reported raising just shy of $5 million in 2018, and had $464,000 in the bank, and an affiliated Jobs, Freedom and Security PAC raised $1.3 million in 2018, and had $1.4 million in the bank.
