U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia is a fundraising juggernaut, raising more than $81 million so far this cycle and holding nearly $33 million in campaign cash, or $30 million more than his opponent in the November election, Republican Representative Mike Collins.
It might not matter anymore.
Ossoff’s financial edge in a state that President Donald Trump won in the 2024 election may have effectively been erased by the U.S. Supreme Court, which last week struck down limits on how much individual candidates could coordinate their spending with national political parties.
The Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee, among others, will now be able to spend unlimited funds from their big donors in coordination with political campaigns.
That could well tilt the playing field in favor of Republicans, who tend to raise more money from big, corporate donors through national committees, over Democrats, whose candidates tend to raise more money from small individual donors.
While the national committees could previously spend on behalf of their candidates, party officials say the restrictions on coordinating their messaging and strategy with individual campaigns made that spending far less targeted and effective.
Democratic candidates currently have a staggering cash advantage over Republican rivals in competitive Senate races: $16 million in North Carolina, $9 million in Ohio and $8 million in Texas.
Unlimited funds from the Republican Party’s national apparatus, however, can now shore up lagging fundraisers such as Collins in Georgia and Texas’ Republican Senate nominee, Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Under existing laws, donors are permitted to give national political committees tens of thousands of dollars, but their contributions to individual campaigns are capped at $7,000 per election cycle. And until Tuesday’s ruling, coordinated expenditures for Senate races were limited to between $130,000 and $4 million, depending on each state’s voting-age population.
Now that those caps no longer exist, Republican committees instantly stand to benefit. Each entered June with more cash than their Democratic counterparts, including a $110 million gulf between the RNC and the DNC, which has $18 million in debt.
POLLS SHOW TIGHT RACES ACROSS THE COUNTRY
Republicans hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate, where Democrats would need to net four seats in the November election to win control. Despite a favorable political environment for Democrats as high living costs and the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran erode President Donald Trump’s popularity, winning the Senate will be an uphill battle.
Democrats are defending seats in Trump-won Georgia and Michigan, while targeting Republican-held seats in North Carolina, Maine, Ohio and Alaska. They have also set their sights on more Republican-leaning seats in Iowa and Texas.
A series of New York Times/Siena polls, released on Wednesday found Democrats leading in North Carolina and within the margin of error in Maine, Texas, Alaska, Iowa and Ohio. The Democratic candidates are out-raising Republicans in every state but Alaska and Iowa.