Ashley Moody raises $700K in first month of reelection bid

Ashley Moody. Image via Scott Powers.

Attorney General Ashley Moody raised more than $700,000 in the first month of her official reelection campaign.

Moody, who launched her bid for a second term on Sept. 1, raised $702,995 in September, increasing her head start as she looks toward 2022.

The Republican Attorney General’s political committee, Friends of Ashley Moody, began September with more than $2 million on hand.

Friends of Ashley Moody has now raised more than $7 million since it launched three years ago. Most of that flowed to the account in the lead-up to Moody’s 2018 win, but the account showed little activity after Election Day, raising $10,000 or so a month. Fundraising started gaining speed in November when the committee reeled in $90,000. Since February, the committee has consistently brought in six-figure donations.

Excluding Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has been raising millions a month of late, Moody has outpaced all statewide candidates in fundraising so far this year. And she has done so with no credible challenger — or any challenger — to bring out donors.

Through Thursday, Moody remains the only candidate running for Attorney General, a statewide elected Cabinet position.

A former federal prosecutor and judge, Moody has proved herself a fundraising machine. A campaign kickoff event on Sept. 28 helped buoy her strong first month.

A darling among conservatives, Moody has waded into several contentious issues.

She joined a Texas lawsuit to toss the presidential election results in four states and blasted the Biden administration over Supreme Court concerns.

Big Tech also drew the Attorney General’s ire. Alongside other attorneys general, she sued Google multiple times over antitrust laws within a year.

Critics lambasted Moody’s trip to the Southern border. In July, Moody, DeSantis and Senate President Wilton Simpson met with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to discuss border security issues. Later that month, a government watchdog group ranked Moody among the nation’s top “obstructionists” of “progress.”

Moody’s office called the charges “a blatant political attack from a liberal, dark-money group targeting strong Republican leaders.”

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Florida Politics reporters Jason Delgado and Drew Wilson contributed to this story.