With less than a week until election day, candidate third-quarter finance reports are beginning to be posted on the State Board of Elections website. Unlike federal elections with the FEC, reports to the state board of elections require processing before they become public on the North Carolina State Board of Elections (NCSBE) website.
Though we are waiting on a majority of the reports for the state legislature, we have all but two Democratic and three Libertarian reports in for the Council of State elections and this year’s Supreme Court race online. Finding these reports typically requires you to look up each candidate on the State Board of Elections website; we at the Civitas Center for Public Integrity have compiled the topline data for each candidate’s finances up to the third quarter. The data set can be found below:
North Carolina State Wide elections Q3 reports: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PWWrRiB_yndiTWixT33kXpMUO75c7AdvtKNbjUEhRVU/edit?usp=sharing
Millions have been coming into North Carolina’s Gubernatorial election, with Democrat Josh Stein alone raising over $77.5 million this election. Millions are also coming into the State Attorney General election and State Supreme Court seat. With only a few exceptions, nearly all of the Democratic and Republican statewide candidates have raised at least half a million for their election this year.
Gubernatorial Race
While contributions from individuals have increased since the 2020 election, a large portion of the money going to these candidates comes from political party committees. Democrats have raised over $46 million from party committees, with Republicans raising nearly ~$13.5 million. While Stein is by far the largest party funding beneficiary at $33.7 million, the Republican gubernatorial candidate has not received nearly as much, with only $ 1.1 million over the entirety of the election cycle coming from party sources.
Robinson does not appear to have received any direct funding or in-kind contributions from the Republican Party’s largest committees, the State Republican Party, or the Republican Council of State Committee after the CNN story on Robinson came out in mid-September.
Stein’s committee has received unprecedented levels of financing, shattering the record for state-level office fundraising Governor Roy Cooper set in 2020. Stein’s astronomical funding can be partially attributed to the North Carolina Democratic Leadership Committee run by Stein’s consultants firm, Nexus Strategies, partner Scott Falmlen. The Democratic Leadership Committee has moved $29 million into cash into the Stein Campaign.
While Stein has received a lot of party contributions, he has also moved over $11 million in contributions back into the State Democratic Party. This money shuffling has likely helped the State Democratic Party finance many of its other down-ballot races.
While there are a few questions on Stein’s campaign fund, specifically an individual contribution from Donna Gutterman for $59,100.00, a contribution that well exceeds the state’s $6,400 individual contribution limit, there is no doubt the Democrats have put heavy emphasis on financing this year’s gubernatorial election.
Attorney General Race
The second most-financed race falls to North Carolina’s Attorney General election between two sitting congressmen, Jeff Jackson (D) and Dan Bishop (R). Both candidates have raised substantial amounts of money, with Jackson pulling in nearly $13 million and Bishop resting at just over $7 million. Unlike Robinson in the Gubernatorial race, Bishop received substantial funding from the party, even beating out Democrat Jackson with $ 4.7 million to $3.4 million.
Both candidates are sitting congressmen, so they could not directly move their finances from their congressional fund to a state-level race. However, both appear to have given money to their respective leadership committees, which have since provided substantial funding to both of their candidates.
Lower Ballot Races
While we don’t have all reports in for the North Carolina State House and Senate, the NCSBE is working to upload these files throughout the week. I will be updating these files each morning as more reports come in. You can track candidates for both state legislative chambers through the links below:
North Carolina House: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1anki0Q2uCS1yjM-OPepNr1kFgpcNjYoGgrZtlL3e-Iw/edit?usp=sharing
North Carolina Senate: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Nt0iazDRgk-jkTx_jEr9P8amfh8z8OkxmuETI5jjKF8/edit?usp=sharing
