Jesse Scheckner
U.S. Rep. María Elvira Salazar passed the $1 million mark last quarter in re-election fundraising for this cycle, ensuring that any Democratic challenger who runs against her will face an uphill financial battle.
Salazar raised more than $318,500 between July 1 and Sept. 30, with support from a passel of fellow Republican politicians, close to 100 personal donations and a handful of trade and business groups.
She also spent $132,500 and amassed $32,000 of debt in outstanding consulting fees.
By the end of Q3, she had close to $707,000 left to spend.
Salazar received maxed-out donations of $6,600 — equal to $3,300 each for the Primary and General Elections, which are counted as separate races — from more than a dozen finance, real estate, tech and fuel executives in the third quarter of 2023.
Among them: PayCargo CEO Eduardo Del Riego; TD Synnex Chief Strategy Officer Sergio Farche; MFB Clearing Corp. CEO Mark Fisher; Global Credit Advisers managing partner Steven Hornstein; Mercury Fuels President Eric Beelar; and AEG Fuels CEO Chris Clementi, whose father and the company’s prior CEO, Michael Clementi, matched that donation.
Miami Beach hotelier Omer Horev gave $6,600 as well, and chipped in the same sum through his company, Horev Hospitality. Another $6,600 came from Fred Voccola, CEO of IT company Kaseya, which bought the name sponsorship rights of the Miami Heat arena after the collapse of cryptocurrency exchange FTX late last year.
Mitchell Modell, the former CEO of Modell’s Sporting Goods, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in March 2020, gave $6,600 too. Modell has dealings in Miami’s real estate market and works with Rishi Kapoor, an attorney and real estate developer now embroiled in an alleged pay-to-play scheme involving Miami Mayor Francis Suarez that is under investigation by the FBI, State Attorney’s Office and Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust.
Salazar’s largest single gain was a $10,000 contribution from the leadership political action committee (PAC) of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.
The GOP-affiliated Congressional Leadership Fund gave her $5,000, doubling its prior donations to her this cycle.
Other $5,000 contributions came from PACs associated with U.S. Reps. Andrew Garbarino and Nicole Malliotakis of New York, and Roger Williams of Texas.
U.S. Rep. Carol Miller of West Virginia handed Salazar $3,000, adding to $1,000 she’d previously given. U.S. Rep. Kat Carmack of Florida contributed $2,000, while a PAC backing her called American GRIT kicked in an additional $6,000.
Other congressional giving included $2,000 apiece from French Hill of Arkansas and Greg Murphy of North Carolina, as well as $1,000 from Brian Mast of Florida, Mark Alford of Missouri, Rick Allen of Georgia, Stephanie Bice of Oklahoma, Garret Graves of Louisiana, Erin Houchin of Indiana, Lisa McClain of Michigan and Gary Palmer of Alabama, among several others.
Value in Electing Women (View) PAC, which helps Republican women win office, gave Salazar $5,000.
Five business advocacy groups donated in Q3, including the Mason Contractor Association of America and American Council of Engineering Companies, which each contributed $5,000.
The American Hospital Association gave $2,500, while the National Association of Realtors and American Society of Anesthesiologists gave $2,000 and $1,500, respectively.
Other contributions included $5,000 apiece from PricewaterhouseCoopers and Comcast, and a $1,500 check from AT&T.
Salazar’s spending overwhelmingly covered general campaign upkeep, donation processing fees, travel and food costs.
The rest predominantly went to consultants. She paid West Palm Beach-based Inspire Capital more than $20,000 and the Virginia-based Stanton Group $14,500 for “finance consulting.”
Another $10,000 went to Guest Booker, a Tennessee-based firm that helps programs and people get or be guests on TV and radio shows. Salazar paid $9,000 more to Homestead-based MV Consulting Advisors for “grassroots/field consulting.”
She also paid $4,700 to Michigan-headquartered Dickinson Wright for legal consulting, $4,500 to Miramar-based consultant Andres Garcia for help with digital communications, $3,300 to Virginia-based OnMessage Digital Fundraising for related services and $3,000 to H&H Publishing Corp. in Naples for “communications/translation consulting.”
Salazar’s records show that she spent a whopping $5,000 on hair and makeup work from Coral Gables-based Catriels Unlimited for a campaign event on July 11.
CD 27 covers a large portion of Miami-Dade County, including the municipalities of Miami, Coral Gables, Cutler Bay, Key Biscayne, Palmetto Bay, Pinecrest, North Bay Village, South Miami, West Miami and the unincorporated neighborhoods of Coral Terrace, Fisher Island, Glenvar Heights, Kendall, Olympia Heights, Richmond Heights, Sunset, The Crossings, Three Lakes, Westchester and Westwood Lakes.
Salazar comfortably won re-election in November with more than 57% of the vote, defeating former Democratic state Sen. Annette Taddeo in what was the costliest and among the most closely watched races last election cycle.
So far, one other person is running against Salazar in the 2024 cycle. Fellow Cuban American Republican Royland Lara filed for the CD 27 race in late September. He then refiled Oct. 2, after the deadline for Q3 financial reporting and has shown no activity since.
Candidates faced a Sunday deadline to report all campaign finance activity through Sept. 30.
One comment
https://paymenthistory1.blogspot.com/
October 19, 2023 at 1:06 pm
Hey , I know how badly you need money. Here’s an opportunity to earn some money by Gift Cards. d I think this can helpful for you.. If you are interested, just follow this link.
Comments are closed.