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I did a lot of posting before now on the city finance reports, so it’s probably best to summarize:
8 Day reports for Mayoral candidates
30 Day reports – that post was for the At Large candidates but it links to the previous posts for other candidates
July 2023 reports – that was part 4 of 4, with links to the previous parts
On to the show. I didn’t upload the reports I examined this time, so go find them yourself at the city finance reports interface.
Name Raised Spent Loan On Hand
======================================================
Whitmire 790,007 1,195,804 0 2,532,778
Hollins 96,467 146,371 0 272,229
Ramirez 23,590 41,752 30,000 3,998
Davis 7,100 3,301 2,000 3,476
Carter 2,600 71,247 4,000 4,495
Plummer
Alcorn 16,361 80,619 0 132,395
Peck 8,450 11,685 0 43,718
Jackson 13,450 19,602 0 11,649
Kamin 19,335 69,609 0 210,264
E-Shabazz 21,925 34,624 1,500 634
Flickinger
Thomas 35,150 10,645 0 182,754
Huffman 9,310 62,823 0 385
Castillo 28,541 73,229 10,000 7,712
Martinez 19,185 30,384 0 62,946
Pollard 33,350 13,575 40,000 1,002,393
C-Tatum 15,500 28,854 0 223,718
Turner 47,651 237,025 0 575,759
Jackson Lee 109,567 369,999 0 90,805
Garcia 113,705 260,696 0 5,228
Khan 1,005 66,463 5,000 0
Gallegos 25 2,509 0 127,646
Edwards 0 53,950 0 16,191
Knox 0 0 0 0
Sanchez 19,883 43,369 198,128 10,415
Robinson 0 8,533 0 241,991
One thing to keep in mind here is that these reports cover different periods for different people. It all depends on what their path was in the 2023 election. Those who were in the December runoff had filed an 8-day report for that race, so the January report covers basically just December. Those who had at least one opponent in November but who won without needing a runoff filed an 8-day report for the November election, so their January reports cover the last two months. People who were unopposed in November or who were not on the ballot either due to term limits or dropping out of a race (e.g., Amanda Edwards) last filed in July, so this report covers the last six months. Clear? Good.
I have the totals here for all of the current city of Houston elected officials, plus various others of interest, mostly but not entirely from the Mayor’s race. I did not see reports from CM Fred Flickinger, CM Letitia Plummer, or mayoral candidate Lee Kaplan. As noted before, sometimes these get lost in the system and may turn up later. But as we’re now into March, I wouldn’t expect much.
Mayor Whitmire had a crap-ton of money going into this race, and still has a crap-ton left after spending over twelve million dollars, which is my eyeball total from all his reports; I didn’t post about the 8-day runoff report, but his is here and showed $1.7 million spent. It wasn’t that long ago that $12 million would have been a respectable amount to spend in a state race. He’s operating under campaign finance limits now, but don’t expect that to be too much of a hindrance – he raised that $790K in less than thirty days, after all. He’ll be north of $5 million before you know it, maybe in a year’s time. If anyone wants to challenge him in 2027, that’s the environment they’ll be getting into.
Sylvester Turner ends his time as Mayor with a bit more than a half million dollars still in the bank. He has some time to do something with all that, including use it to run for some other office, which I don’t expect him to do. The single best thing he could do is spend it this year helping Democrats win elections. Whoever is close enough to him to put that idea into his head, please do so. I presume Sheila Jackson Lee used some of that money in her primary against Amanda Edwards, but at this point that doesn’t matter. Someone recently asked me if I thought this would be her last term in Congress and my answer was an emphatic No. She’s going to be there until she loses or she decides to leave, and I don’t expect that to be any time soon.
Mike Knox is running for Sheriff, but he didn’t bring any financial resources with him to that race. Robert Gallegos was rumored to want to run for HD145 in this year’s primary but that didn’t happen. He may turn up somewhere another time. The same is true for David Robinson, but it’s not clear to me what other office out there is a good fit for him. You too can use your excess campaign money to help Democrats win this year, David! All the cool kids are doing it!
We return once again to the question of What Is Ed Pollard Doing With All That Money? Your guess is as good as mine. I hesitate to say this for fear of speaking it into existence, but I suppose one possibility is a run for County Judge next year. If he has any plans to run for something else, he’ll need to keep them to himself for the time being because of the resign-to-run requirements that came with the four-year terms on Council. The same is true for the other members of Council with six-figure balances. Everyone on that list except for new Controller Chris Hollins is now in their second and final term, so there’s also the option of running for Mayor in 2027. Let’s just say that’s getting waaaaaaaaaay ahead of ourselves and leave it at that.
That’s it for the 2023 finance reports. I would have preferred to publish this sooner but with all the primary stuff I never could fit it in. It’ll be time for the April reports for Congressional candidates before you know it, and we have the May elections and the primary runoffs as well. We’ll just keep moving on.