Kelly Hayes
Democratic Congressional candidate Eric Lynn maintains his cash-on-hand lead after entering the new year with more than $800,000 in his pocket, Lynn’s campaign announced Wednesday.
Lynn, who’s running for Florida’s 13th Congressional District, raised $240,000 in Q4, which ended Dec. 31.
“I am grateful for the continued support my campaign has received,” Lynn said in a statement. “This is a tough race — with the results impacting the health and security of our democracy — but it is clear that we have the support it will take to be successful in 2022.”
The latest fundraising update from the Lynn campaign puts Lynn neck-and-neck with primary election opponent, state Rep. Ben Diamond. More details on December fundraising will be available when financial reports are submitted at the end of January.
Last week, Diamond’s campaign announced it was nearing the $1 million fundraising mark.
The update comes after a Global Strategy Group poll showed Lynn leads his Democratic opponents in name recognition and favorability. The former national security adviser under President Barack Obama was familiar to 35% of respondents and favored by 30%. Diamond was familiar to 28% and favorable to 25%. State Rep. Michele Rayner, meanwhile, was familiar to 29% of respondents and favored by 24%.
The poll of 458 likely Democratic Primary voters was paid for by Lynn’s campaign and conducted from Dec. 20-21 and did not ask respondents which candidate they would vote for. The poll’s margin of error is 4.6 percentage points. According to the latest voter registration data from the Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections, there are nearly 191,000 registered Democrats in CD 13.
Florida’s CD 13 race will be one of the most closely watched in the 2020 midterms. U.S. Rep. Charlie Crist is leaving a seat previously long held by Republicans that could help shift the balance of power in Washington if Democrats lose it.
The winner of the Democratic Primary will face off against either Air Force veteran Anna Paulina Luna, former Lisa Murkowski adviser Amanda Makki or nonprofit founder Audrey Henson.
Makki lost the Republican Primary to Luna in 2020. Crist then beat Luna in the General Election with 53% of the vote.
Democrats have a voter registration advantage of 20,000 over Republicans in the district. But Republican presence has been growing since the GOP lost the seat to Crist.
