Spanberger, Stoney are the big fundraisers in the still-forming 2025 races

Our attention these past few tumultuous days have been riveted on national politics. Important as those are, let’s not forget that state and local races are still going on. A new round of campaign finance reports serve to remind us of that.

Now, before we jump into the numbers, let me give my usual advisory on campaign fundraising: Money isn’t everything. Yes, it definitely helps to have more than the other side, but money alone doesn’t guarantee victory. I’m reminded of the old story — perhaps true, perhaps not — about the pet food manufacturer that spent millions on a whizz-bang Madison Avenue marketing campaign. The dog food had a fancy package, a catchy jingle. Sales, though, didn’t budge. When corporate executives puzzled over why the product wasn’t moving, someone quietly suggested: “Maybe the dogs don’t like it.”

The pointing being: All the money in the world won’t help a campaign that’s out of sync with what voters want.

Another advisory: These finance reports are for state and local candidates, not candidates seeking federal office.

So, let’s get on with the business:

Spanberger appears to have a big financial advantage in the 2025 governor’s race

The key word there is “appears.” Abigail Spanberger is retiring from her 7th District congressional seat to seek the Democratic nomination for governor, which she seems assured of getting since her main competition has dropped out.

As of June 30, she has $5,363,161 in the bank. One more advisory: For now, I’m focused on “cash on hand,” not what candidates have raised and already spent. All these campaigns we’re about to look at have spent some money already, but the key thing this far out is the size of their campaign treasury as they look toward the fall. Or, in the case of the gubernatorial candidates, fall 2025.

That brings us to this, and the reason I use the word “appears”: There is no Republican equivalent right now. No Republican has formally announced for governor. We all assume that Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears will run, but she hasn’t said so, and hasn’t formally filed yet. That means her political action committee is on a different reporting schedule, so we can’t make a comparison.

Attorney General Jason Miyares is also a possible candidate for the Republican nomination, but, like Earle-Sears, he hasn’t filed, either, so the same rules apply.

All we can say for certain is that Spanberger will be very well-funded in 2025. At this point in the last gubernatorial cycle, Terry McAuliffe had $1.59 million in hand and Glenn Youngkin hadn’t even entered the race. Spanberger’s already raised more than $7 million since she announced last November.

Here’s something else that may factor into Republican thinking: the presidential election. After Donald Trump won in 2016, his administration provoked a voter backlash that sank Republican candidates in Virginia. Democrats swept the statewide races by wide margins and picked up seats in the House of Delegates. Once Trump left office, Republicans won again. If Trump is elected in November — which right now appears likely — will he provoke a similar reaction? Virginia Republicans are right to be wary. Given their 2017 experience, they’d be better off next year with Joe Biden in the White House.

Stoney leads money race for lieutenant governor

Because neither Earle-Sears nor Miyares has formally announced for the Republican nomination for governor — and because I suspect many Republicans are waiting to see what happens in November — the Republican side is in limbo as far as 2025 is concerned.

However, there’s a lively four-way contest for the Democratic nomination for lieutenant governor.

Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney, who dropped down from the governor’s race, has the most money: $702,958.

State Sen. Aaron Rouse of Virginia Beach, whose profile rose this year as the sponsor of bills to legalize both retail cannabis and so-called skill games, is in second place at $411,696.

Babur Lateef, chair of the Prince William County School Board, has $262,977.

State Sen. Ghazala Hashmi of Chesterfield County, the most recent entrant, has $174,670.

Attorney general’s race remains unclear

The big question: Will Miyares seek reelection or run for governor? Until he decides that, nothing will happen on the Republican side here — and it’s hard to measure the Democratic side, as well.

Henrico County Commonwealth’s Attorney Shannon Taylor has announced for the Democratic nomination and has $293,325 in hand. Former Norfolk Del. Jay Jones sure seems to be running, but hasn’t formally filed, so we don’t have a report from him yet. Taylor looks like she has a decent haul of campaign cash — it’s more than two candidates running for lieutenant governor — but until we have something to compare it to, we really don’t know.

For what it’s worth, Miyares may find himself in a political bind: If he runs for governor, he’ll face a primary battle — and, as explained before, the Republican nomination next year might be less valuable if Trump is in office. He could run for reelection and, as the incumbent, would presumably have the advantage — although in an era of straight-ticket voting, would that incumbency help him if next year turns out not to be a good year for Republicans?

In the modern era, we’ve seen five statewide office-holders seek reelection and later try for the governorship: Andrew Miller, Mary Sue Terry, Don Beyer, Bill Bolling, Mark Herring. That didn’t work out for any of them, so the argument that Miyares should seek reelection and run for governor another year isn’t supported by history. Here’s why the run-for-reelection-and-run-for-governor-later approach doesn’t work: It requires a political party to win statewide three times in a row, and that doesn’t happen much (and hasn’t happened at all since 1989).

Now let’s turn to some local races of note.

Roanoke mayoral candidates roughly even in campaign cash

Roanoke has a three-way race to succeed Mayor Sherman Lea, a Democrat who is retiring. Vice Mayor Joe Cobb is the Democratic nominee. Former Mayor David Bowers, who served 16 years as a Democrat, is attempting a comeback as a Republican. Meanwhile, Stephanie Moon Reynolds is forgoing a reelection bid for her council seat to run for mayor as an independent.

I’ve looked at how the presidential race might impact the mayor’s race in a previous column but here’s the short version: Roanoke is a reliably Democratic city where the Democratic presidential vote runs about 60%. Even in a “down” Democratic presidential year such as 2016, Hillary Clinton still took 56% in Roanoke. If voters cast a straight ticket, that would make Cobb the favorite, although it’s unclear whether Moon Reynolds will pull away enough votes from Cobb to allow Bowers to win — or to win herself. I could construct a winning scenario for each one.

What’s notable to me in these campaign finance reports are two things: All three candidates have roughly the same amount of money, but Cobb has the least.

Bowers has $8,978 in hand, Moon Reynolds $8,108, Cobb $7,753.

That difference may not be significant, but it is interesting. I also have a theory: Fundraising counts less in local races than it does statewide ones. That’s because at the local level, voters are more likely to know the candidates personally and be more swayed by those interactions than by some ad they see on TV.

Democrat McGuire, Republican Garrett lead Roanoke council fundraising

Roanoke has seven candidates seeking three council seats: three Democrats, two Republicans and two independents, one of whom is Evelyn Powers, who was elected five times as a Democrat to the city treasurer’s post. She’s retiring from that position but now is running for the city council. Of note: None of these candidates are council incumbents so Roanoke is guaranteed at least three newcomers on its next seven-member council. (That number could rise to four if Cobb is elected mayor, because that would trigger a special election to fill the rest of his council term.) That’s a curious wrinkle: A vote for the vice mayor is indirectly a vote for a new council majority.

Here’s how the cash in hand stands as of June 30:

Terry McGuire (D) $16,977
Jim Garrett (R) $8,900
Phazhon Nash (D) $4,391
Benjamin Woods (D) $2,843
Nick Hagen (R) $2,079
Evelyn Powers (I) $884
Cathy Reynolds (I) $176

Powers and Reynolds got into the race just before the June 18 filing deadline, so I wouldn’t read anything into their low campaign finance numbers. I am struck by the fundraising gap between McGuire and Garrett and all the others. My general observation here is that Republicans seem likely to make a well-funded push to win some seats in Roanoke. Whether that’s enough to overcome Roanoke’s natural Democratic leanings, especially in a presidential year, well, we’ll see.

Republican has huge campaign cash lead in pivotal Lynchburg ward

Lynchburg elects three council members at-large and four from wards. Those four ward seats are on the ballot this year. Three are in districts with clear political leanings: Ward IV (now held by Republican Chris Faraldi) is red, Ward III (now held by Republican Jeff Helgeson) is also red, Ward II (now held by Democrat Sterling Wilder) is blue. That leaves Ward I, a classic swing ward. The incumbent, MaryJane Dolan, who was elected as an independent but often identified as a Democrat, is retiring. Ward I voters now have three choices: Republican Jacqueline Timmer, Democrat Randy Smith and independent Cameron Howe.

The key issue may be how Ward I voters feel about some of the council members from other wards, particularly Helgeson and at-large council member Marty Misjuns. They’ve formed a hardline Republican faction that has repeatedly clashed with Faraldi and Mayor Stephanie Reed, both fellow Republicans.

A Smith victory would preserve the current dynamics on the council, for better or worse. A Howe victory, well, we don’t know. In an interview with WLNI-FM, she had some warm words for Reed and in her campaign announcement decried the factionalism on council. A Timmer victory, though, could lead to Helgeson being named the next mayor. The vote last time was 4-3 for Reed over Helgeson. If everyone voted the same way as before, but the Ward I vote changed, then Helgeson would be mayor.

We’ll see what Ward I voters think of that. In the meantime, Timmer has a huge lead in campaign cash, huge as in 8.65 to 1. Timmer has $38,116, Smith has $4,404 and Howe $714 — although the same caveat applies here as it does to the independents in Roanoke. Since Howe  just got into the race, her finance report may not be indicative of what we see later in the campaign.

Here’s one way to measure the size of Timmer’s campaign cash: She has more money in hand for a single ward seat in Lynchburg that the three candidates for mayor in Roanoke, a larger city, have combined. She also has more money than all nine candidates for council seats in Danville do combined. Of course, as you’ll soon see, that’s easy to do:

Four of nine candidates in Danville show no fundraising

Danville has nine candidates running for five seats. This includes four incumbents. Four candidates show up with no campaign fundraising. Here’s how they stand:

Madison Whittle (incumbent) $9,972
Shaveka Frazier $3,770
Lee Vogler (incumbent) $2,861
Larry Campbell Jr. (incumbent) $1,759
Maureen Belko $144

And then Petrina Carter, Barry Mayo (incumbent), Felice McWilliams and Sherman Saunders show up at zero.

Wallace leads fundraising in Salem

Salem has four candidates for three seats. Incumbent Jim Wallace has a substantial edge in cash: $8,617. With that much money he could move next door and run for mayor of Roanoke! Behind him are former council member John Saunders at $1,264, Mayor Renee Turk at $1,060 and independent Anne Marie Green at all of $25.

Where all these numbers come from

Martinsville also has city council races, but the figures posted there are all so low as to be inconsequential at the moment. For all these figures and more, see the Virginia Public Access Project , which does all Virginians a favor by making these numbers accessible.

Please keep this in mind, too. Reporting all these numbers isn’t free. It costs VPAP money to collect them and present them and it costs us money to report on these and other things. If you’d like to guarantee more of that kind of reporting, we’d appreciate your donation as much as some of these politicians would (and, dare we say, more?). Plus, if you really want a bumper sticker, we now have those available in our merch store.

Want more political news and analysis?

I write a weekly political newsletter, West of the Capital, that goes out each Friday at 3 p.m. This week I’ll be catching up on a busy week in politics. Among the items we’ll have:

• More on Frank Kilgore , the late St. Paul lawyer who wrote the book “JD Vance Is a Fake Hillbilly.”
• A closer look at the VCU poll that shows Donald Trump leading Joe Biden in Virginia by 3 percentage points.
• More on the 5th District congressional race.

You can sign up for West of the Capital or any of our other free newsletters here:

• The Daily Everything we publish, every weekday
• The Weekly A roundup of our 10 most popular stories each week, sent Saturdays
• Cardinal Weather In-depth weather news and analysis on our region, sent Wednesdays
• West of the Capital A weekly round-up of politics, with a focus on our region, sent Fridays
• The Weekend A roundup of local events, delivered Thursdays
• Cardinal 250 Revisiting stories from our nation’s founding. Delivered monthly

The post Spanberger, Stoney are the big fundraisers in the still-forming 2025 races appeared first on Cardinal News .