Democratic legislative campaigns cash-starved
Fundraisers prepare to be outspent by the GOP in crucial races
TALLAHASSEE — As millions are spent on ads in a crowded Democratic presidential primary, including large sums by billionaires Michael Bloomberg and Tom Steyer, fundraisers for Democratic candidates trying to gain control of state legislatures can only watch in dismay.
Bloomberg jumped into the race last month with a $34 million ad buy, including $3.5 million in Florida alone and $1.1 million of that in the Miami media market.
“Any fundraiser looks at eyepopping figures like that and thinks, ‘My god, what I could do right now on the ground,’ particularly in targeted state Senate races,” said Beth Matuga, a Tallahassee-based Democratic fundraiser.
Bloomberg’s fellow billionaire Tom Steyer has spent at least $45 million on ads so far, easily outpacing other candidates. He’s averaging 1% in national polling. Bloomberg’s ad blitz has garnered as much as 6% in some polls, but he’s still fifth behind frontrunners Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg.
Legislative races, particularly state Senate races in Florida, have grown more expensive with each passing election cycle.
Sen. Oscar Braynon, who led
Democratic Senate campaign efforts in 2014, says a Democrat in a competitive general election that year needed a minimum of $4 million to $6 million. For next year, they’ll need $8 million to $9 million, and that’s anticipating a Republican candidate and their allies will spend up to $20 million.
Braynon, though, isn’t as critical of Bloomberg and Steyer, noting that each has donated heavily to Democratic causes and candidates in Florida. Bloomberg’s gun control advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety gave $4.3 million in the 2018 election cycle. Steyer’s NextGen Florida poured in $8.5 million, $2.8 million of which went to Andrew Gillum’s gubernatorial campaign.
“They’ve at least been part of the fight,” Braynon said.
Yet the amount of money being spent on presidential campaigns still irks other Democrats vying against a Florida GOP money machine that usually outraises and outspends them in competitive races.
“Every donor is entitled to give what they want to whom they want, but coming from a state legislative perspective, that kind of money makes a huge, huge difference in Democratic efforts to flip chambers,” Matuga said.
One Senate seat Democrats are hoping to flip next year is District 9, based in Seminole County. It is open because incumbent GOP Sen. David Simmons is term-limited, but Jason Brodeur, a former GOP House member, has already racked up $2.5 million and spent $1.8 million. The three Democrats in the race have raised less than $30,000 combined.
And the stakes in 2020 go beyond flipping a seat or two in each chamber.
Republicans hold a 23-17 advantage over Democrats in the Senate. Along with the District 9 race, Democrats also hope to gain a Miami-Dade Senate seat next year, which would leave the GOP with a narrow 21-19 edge.
That’s critical ahead of 2022, when lawmakers will redraw congressional and legislative maps. Republicans could draw more favorable maps for themselves to ensure they maintain control of both chambers for another decade. A margin of only one seat will make it that much tougher to keep all their members in line and ignore Democrats.
Despite the close margins in the Senate and the importance of the redistricting fight, however, some Democrats are concentrating their efforts on regaining control in the House, where Republicans have a much larger 73-47 advantage.
Democrats would need to flip 14 seats while losing none to take control of the House, but Gillum says that chamber will be easier to retake than the Senate in 2020. He’s teaming up with Forward Majority, a political committee that helped gain control of the Virginia General Assembly for Democrats this year. It is targeting 25 seats in Florida.
Gillum’s political committee, Forward Florida, is donating $150,000 to House Victory Caucus to aid the effort.
“I actually see the map in the House to be much more achievable,” Gillum told Politico when the effort was announced last week. “I do believe that we are in reach of those 14 seats. But we’ve got to compete, and we’ve got to bring a level of unprecedented resources to that fight.”
Gillum’s committee, though, is also putting $450,000 toward the Florida Democratic Party’s efforts to target registered voters who haven’t voted in recent elections and suggest vote-by-mail as an option instead of physically going to the polls. Those efforts, he said, helped nearly swing the governor’s race and could help Democrats in 2020.
While Democrats have lost most of the big statelevel races for governor and Cabinet positions, they’ve been slowly gaining ground in the Legislature. In 2010, there were only 12 Democrats in the Senate and 39 in the House. It’s a longer, slower process to rebuild a majority, Matuga said, one that takes time, resources and effort without a splashy, headline-grabbing instant result.
“It’s not glamorous, it’s not pretty,” Matuga said. “It takes a long-term view of flipping the chamber. We’re going to get there, but I think it’s important not to tell anyone that it’s going to happen overnight or it’s going to be magic.”