Beto O’Rourke, the Democratic candidate for governor in Texas, reported a massive fundraising haul during the second quarter of the year, outpacing Gov. Greg Abbott despite trailing the incumbent in the polls.
O’Rourke raked in $27.6 million from more than 511,000 individual donors between Feb. 20 and June 30, according to his campaign. That puts him ahead of Abbott’s gains during the same time period, as the incumbent raised $24.9 million from nearly 113,000 donors.
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“We raised this money from over half a million different contributions — more than quadruple the number of contributions to Abbott,” O’Rourke’s campaign wrote in a fundraising email shortly after the numbers were released. “More than ever, it is clear that we have the momentum to defeat Greg Abbott.”
It’s unclear how the latest dump of funding will affect the next few months before the November election, as Abbott boasts nearly $46 million cash on hand. O’Rourke’s campaign did not disclose how much money it has on hand, although the campaign reported about $6.8 million as of mid-February.
The Democratic candidate’s massive haul highlights a pivotal moment in the fight for control over the state, and his second-quarter numbers mark the most money a Texas candidate running for a statewide office has ever raised in a single fundraising period, the campaign said.
The race for the governor of Texas has been closely watched ever since O’Rourke announced his bid to unseat Abbott last November, criticizing the state’s “extremist policies” over the last few years.
O’Rourke, a one-time presidential candidate in 2020 and competitive challenger to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) in 2018, has gained widespread attention over the last few months. The Democrat made headlines after a mass shooting at a Texas elementary school left 19 children and two teachers dead by confronting Abbott about the state’s gun laws during a press briefing on May 25.
“This was totally predictable,” O’Rourke said during the encounter. “This is on you until you choose to do something.”
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Despite the record-breaking fundraising numbers, O’Rourke continues to face an uphill battle in his efforts to flip the governor’s mansion blue in the deep-red state. Nearly 50% of voters are leaning toward voting for Abbott in the general election compared to O’Rourke’s 44%, according to recent polling from the University of Houston’s Hobby School of Public Affairs. Another 5% are undecided. The poll, conducted between June 27 and July 7, surveyed 1,169 YouGov respondents who are registered to vote in Texas and had a confidence interval of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points.
