HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Democratic Sen. Bob Casey has raised more than $4 million in the past three months — his best fundraising quarter — as he awaits a Republican challenger for his re-election bid in the critical state of the Pennsylvania battlefield, his campaign said Wednesday.
Casey’s campaign said the fundraising result beat the previous best quarter of his career by more than $1.2 million.
The campaign brings in nearly $6 million to his bank account. That money could prove crucial in securing Casey the resources to successfully campaign in one of the most politically competitive states in the country.
The second-quarter haul gives Casey’s campaign some optimism that Democrats still have support in the state after John Fetterman’s 5 percentage point victory in last year’s race for the open seat in the Pennsylvania Senate.
Casey, 63, is preparing to run for his fourth term. He is a key ally of labor unions and President Joe Biden and gives Democrats a strong contender in their defense of a seat in what is otherwise expected to be a tough 2024 campaign to retain their 51-49 majority in the Senate.
Fetterman, who was lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania, also said he raised $4 million in his first quarter as a Senate candidate in 2021. Fetterman eclipsed that with a third quarter of $22.4 million in 2022 on course to beat Republican Dr Mehmet Oz, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump. Last year’s Senate race was the most expensive ever in Pennsylvania, with a total of $420 million, according to OpenSecrets, a Washington-based nonprofit that tracks campaign finance and data. lobbying.
Casey enters the 2024 race with strong name recognition — his father served two terms as governor of Pennsylvania — and Republicans don’t have a deep pool of potential recruits.
One Republican who could run is former hedge fund CEO David McCormick, who narrowly lost a deadly and costly GOP Senate nomination in 2022 to Oz.
McCormick said he was “seriously considering” running. He brings deep pockets and connections across the worlds of government, finance and Republican politics after a career on Wall Street and at the highest levels of President George W. Bush’s administration.
But many Republicans acknowledge that it will be difficult — if not impossible — to beat Casey.
In Pennsylvania, Casey has already run seven times statewide, winning six of those races, and has never run in a close race for the Senate. He won his 2018 race by 13 percentage points and maintained an active campaign schedule last year by assisting Fetterman.
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