Ossoff raises $800k in first three weeks of Senate bid, campaign says

Democrat Jon Ossoff raised more than $800,000 in the third quarter of the year for his Senate bid against incumbent Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.), his campaign said Tuesday, a substantial fundraising haul for a candidate who launched his campaign only three weeks ago.

Ossoff will report more than $1.3 million in total receipts for the quarter, including funds transferred from a former House campaign committee. He will report $1.3 million in cash on hand, his campaign said.

{mosads}Ossoff’s Senate bid is in his second run for public office in little more than two years. He came close to flipping Georgia’s conservative 6th Congressional District in a 2017 special election but was ultimately defeated by now-former Rep. Karen Handel (R-Ga.).

That special election became the most expensive House race in U.S. history, running up a tab of nearly $50 million. Handel was defeated a year later by Democrat Lucy McBath (D-Ga.). 

Since announcing his Senate bid in early September, Ossoff has racked up a list of high-profile endorsements, including from Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), a longtime congressman and civil rights icon who holds outsize sway in Democratic circles, especially in Georgia.

But Perdue, a first-term senator, is also heading into his reelection with influential allies, including President Trump himself. He has not yet disclosed his third-quarter fundraising haul, but he reported raising nearly $1.2 million in contributions in the second quarter of the year and has more than $4.8 million in cash on hand.