The two leading D.C. mayoral candidates continue to bulk up their war chests for a final-month blitz to the Sept. 12 primary, raising a combined $1.4 million since early June and leaving their competition financially in the dust.
In the most expensive mayor’s race in city history, D.C. Council Chairman Linda Cropp leads Ward 4 Council Member Adrian Fenty in total funds raised during the course of the campaign, $2.54 million to $2.37 million, according to campaign sources and finance reports filed Thursday with the Office of Campaign Finance.
“It shows that my support grows as more and more voters consider the high stakes in this election and the clear differences between me and Mr. Fenty,” Cropp told The Examiner. “We’re going to spend the next month laying out the differences.”
Cropp collected $781,015 since the June 10 filing to Fenty’s $620,000. But Fenty claims more money on hand, $1.6 million to $1.27 million.
“What’s important for my campaign are the resources we have to sprint to the finish,” Fenty said. “I think of volunteers, materials and inventory, number of supporters. But certainly money is one of the those.”
The frontrunners are expected to launch radio and television campaigns in the next two weeks.
As for the other mayoral candidates, Ward 5 Council Member Vincent Orange has spent all but $25,002 of the $466,729 he has raised over 13 months, according to his report. Michael Brown’s campaign is running in the red, with $2,407 on hand and more than $70,000 owed.
Marie Johns had not filed a finance report by press time.
Meanwhile, Cropp took her most personal swipe at Fenty yet on Thursday, attacking his credibility as a lawyer for mishandling the estate of an elderly man between 1999 and 2000.
Fenty received an “informal admonition” last year from the D.C. Bar’s Office of Bar Counsel for failing to act as a competent guardian of a court-appointed client’s holdings.
“The stakes for D.C. are too high, and the differences between the two leading candidates too stark for me not to question Adrian Fenty’s record,” Cropp said.
Fenty, who has taken responsibility for the case, said “it would be foolhardy not to prepare for any different type of campaign, including attacks and going negative, and we will.”
