• FL-Sen: President Joe Biden endorsed former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell at his Tuesday rally in Tampa. Mucarsel-Powell was already the frontrunner in the Aug. 20 Democratic primary to take on Republican Sen. Rick Scott.
Mucarsel-Powell faces intra-party opposition from self-funding businessman Stanley Campbell, but she ended March with a wide $2.8 million to $772,000 cash on hand advantage. Alan Grayson is also running, but the former congressman-turned-perennial candidate had just $98,000 in the bank.
Scott, for his part, ended last month with $3.8 million on hand. Mucarsel-Powell actually outraised the incumbent $3.5 million to $2 million during the first quarter of 2024, but the incumbent's deep pockets allow him to augment his war chest whenever he wants.
The same may not be true of Scott's primary foe, attorney Keith Gross, despite his bluster. The challenger had all of $30,000 to spend at the close of last month, and while the self-described "very wealthy businessman" insisted to the Hill last year that he's open to spending "$20, $30 million" of his own money, he only self-funded $1.9 million through March.
• Michigan: Candidate filing closed Tuesday for Michigan's Aug. 6 primary, and the state has a list of contenders here. However, collecting enough petitions to get on the ballot can be a difficult process, so it's possible that some of the candidates won't appear before voters this summer.
Five Republican candidates for governor, including ostensible frontrunner James Craig, learned this the hard way in 2022 after election authorities disqualified them after they fell victim to a huge fraudulent signature scandal and failed to turn in enough valid petitions. Even before this dramatic episode, though, there were examples of candidates failing to submit the requisite number of signatures.
Given all of this, it's anything but a surprise that no big names launched last-second campaigns. However, as we'll discuss, the close of filing did bring a pair of busy House races into focus.
• MI-08: One declared candidate who did not submit his name is Democrat Dan Moilanen, the executive director of the Michigan Association of Conservation Districts. Moilanen announced in December that he'd run to replace retiring Democratic Rep. Dan Kildee in the competitive 8th District, but he ended March with just $2,000 in the bank before ending his campaign on April 9.
Four Democrats did file to succeed Kildee in this central Michigan constituency: businessman Matt Collier, state Sen. Kristen McDonald Rivet, Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley, and state Board of Education President Pamela Pugh. McDonald Rivet finished last month with a $671,000 to $290,000 cash on hand advantage over Collier, who served as mayor of Flint three decades ago, while Pugh and Neeley respectively had just $55,000 and $24,000 to spend.
The GOP primary also consists of four candidates. The roster features retired Dow Chemical Company executive Mary Draves, 2022 nominee Paul Junge, state Board of Education member Nikki Snyder, and Some Dude Anthony Hudson, who ran for president earlier this cycle.
Junge, who is self-funding most of his effort, ended March with a $1.1 million to $91,000 cash on hand advantage over Synder, while Draves launched her campaign during the opening days of the new quarter. Junge lost the 2022 general election to Kildee by a wide 53-43 two years after Joe Biden took the 8th just 50-48, and his detractors are hoping Draves can put up a serious fight in the primary.
• MI-13: While hedge fund manager John Conyers III told Politico in September that he was planning to announce "soon" that he'd challenge freshman Rep. Shri Thanedar in the Democratic primary, the son and namesake of the late longtime congressman never went forward with his bid.
Four candidates, though, are hoping to deny renomination to Thanedar in the 13th District, a safely Democratic seat that includes much of Detroit and its southwestern suburbs. The most prominent challenger is Adam Hollier, a former state senator and state cabinet official who lost last cycle's crowded primary to Thanedar 28-24. Hollier finished March with $570,000 in the bank, but Thanedar's personal wealth left him with a huge $5.1 million war chest.
Detroit City Councilwoman Mary Waters, who holds a citywide seat, is also running, and while she had a mere $5,000 to spend, her campaign could still pose a problem for Hollier.
Thanedar's victory over Hollier, who is Black, set him up to become the first Indian American to represent Michigan in Congress while also leaving Detroit without an African American member of Congress for the first time since the early 1950s. Waters is also Black, and she could cost Hollier support from voters who might otherwise back him over Thanedar.
The field also includes two unheralded candidates, former Southfield Clerk Sherikia Hawkins and perennial candidate Mohammad Alam. All of Southfield is located in Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib's neighboring 12th District, though it's unlikely Hawkins has much of a base at home: She resigned in 2022 after submitting a no contest plea on election felony charges.
• ND-AL: Protect Freedom PAC, a group aligned with Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, is spending close to $320,000 on a media buy in support of former state Rep. Rick Becker ahead of the June 11 Republican primary for North Dakota's lone House seat. We do not yet have a copy of the ad to boost Becker, who has pledged to join the far-right Freedom Caucus.
This is the first outside spending the FEC has tracked for the race to replace GOP Rep. Kelly Armstrong, who is running for governor. Becker, though, ended March with a large financial advantage over his intra-party rivals thanks in large part to self-funding.
Public Service Commissioner Julie Fedorchak, who has Gov. Doug Burgum's endorsement, outraised Becker $449,000 to $278,000 with donors, but the former plastic surgeon threw down another $550,000 of his own money. Becker ended March with a $797,000 to $412,000 cash on hand edge.
A third Republican, former State Department official Alex Balazs, was the source of every single cent in his $106,000 quarterly haul, and he finished last month with a comparable $96,000 in the bank. Former Miss America Cara Mund, who ran against Armstrong as a pro-choice independent in 2022, launched her Republican primary to replace him after the new quarter began.