RALEIGH — The leading fundraisers to date in North Carolina's U.S. Senate race have announced largely similar contribution numbers for the previous three months.
Republican incumbent Thom Tillis' campaign said on Thursday that he had taken in $1.9 million for the fourth quarter ending Dec. 31. It's a little higher than the $1.6 million that Democrat Cal Cunningham said earlier this month he had raised.
Tillis still had a significant cash advantage entering 2020, however. Tillis' campaign said he had $5.3 million on hand in early January, compared to $1.7 million in cash that Cunningham's campaign said it would report to federal election regulators.
Erica Smith, Trevor Fuller, Atul Goel and Steve Swenson are also running in the Democratic primary March 3. Tillis is facing GOP primary challenges from Paul Wright, Larry Holmquist and Sharon Hudson.
Friday is the deadline to file fourth-quarter reports with the Federal Election Commission.
Tillis ran campaign ads during the fourth quarter when retired financier Garland Tucker was still an announced Republican candidate. But Tillis pulled his ad buys back when Tucker said in December he wouldn't run after all.
Cunningham began running TV ads last week. A group called the VoteVets Action Fund had already been airing pro-Cunningham commercials.
