Days from the June 8 Virginia Congressional primaries, candidates are shoring up their finances for a sprint to the finish line while trying to avoid depleting war chests necessary for general election contests in November.
Fairfax County Supervisor Pat Herrity and Oakton businessman Keith Fimian have slogged through an unusually brutal primary contest to vie for the chance to unseat freshman Democratic Rep. Gerald Connolly.
Fimian raised about $940,000 and had $409,000 on hand through May 19, while Herrity raised about $440,000 and had about $96,000 cash on hand, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. A lack of outside polls make the race difficult to handicap, however.
Connolly had raised more than $1.5 million and had about $1.1 million cash on hand through May 19, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Fimian and Herrity, though, were confident they were sufficiently funded.
“We’ve got the money we need to get this across the finish line,” Herrity said.
He was confident he would be flush for a general election face-off with Connolly as well.
“The business community is … behind me, as are the grassroots,” he said. “I’ve got an awful lot of contributors in a short period of time and an awful lot of business endorsements as well.”
Fimian’s campaign is still calculating exactly how much money would be available after Tuesday, said campaign manager Tim Edson. The campaign should have $100,000 or more at the end of the primary available for the general election, he said.
Edson said he was confident that state and national Republicans would chip in for a match-up with Connolly.
“I think there’s a lot of people, both [in] the state and nationally, who would love to help Keith,” Edson said.
In addition to Virginia’s 11th District, Republicans are also eyeing pick-ups in Virginia’s 2nd and 5th Districts, which are represented by freshman Democrats Glenn Nye and Tom Perriello.
Nye, who raised about $1.5 million through April 18, held a slim financial advantage over Virginia Beach businessman Scott Rigell, whose fundraising total sat at just under $1.3 million though May 19. Perriello had amassed nearly $2 million as of May 16; the next closest Republican challenger was state Sen. Robert Hurt, R-Pittsylvania, at about $510,000 through May 19, according to opensecrets.org.
