Falmouth Democrat outraises GOP

A Gov. Maura Healey-endorsed Democrat running for a South Shore and Cape Cod Senate seat outraised two Republicans contenders in January, according to campaign finance data filed last week.

Rep. Dylan Fernandes pulled in more than $53,000 from over 180 donors, including at least 20 top dollar donations of $1,000 from local business owners, a real estate developer, the chair of the Barr Foundation, and the owners of a party rental company.

The Falmouth Democrat drew an endorsement last year from Healey, Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll, and Sen. Susan Moran, the lawmaker who currently holds the seat and plans not to run for re-election this year to instead pursue a county post.

Other Beacon Hill colleagues have also shuttled dollars his way.

Fernandes spent just over $2,600 and had $173,144 cash on hand at the end of January, according to records filed with the Office of Campaign and Political Finance on Feb. 1. He did not immediately provide a response to the Herald.

Rep. Mathew Muratore, a fifth-term Plymouth Republican, raised just over $14,460 during the same period but individual donor details were not immediately available on the state’s campaign finance website.

Muratore made his bid for the Senate seat official late last month with three separate kickoff events in the district. He spent $2,456 in January, leaving him with $33,771 cash on hand at the end of the month, state records showed.

“We had great support on both sides of the bridge and we are working daily now, since the kickoffs, towards execution of our plan, which includes ongoing fundraising,” he said in a statement to the Herald.

Bourne School Committee member Kari MacRae, a Republican, is also running for the seat. She raised $2,892 in January largely from a $1,000 donation from Steven Kahian, owner of Kahians Appliance in Plymouth.

“I am raising money from the hard-working citizens within the district, not ‘dark money’ or narrative money,” MacRae said in a short statement to the Herald.