First Campaign Cash Reports are Out in Ward 5 Special Election

Photo courtesy of Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie

courtesy of Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie

While others have taken on the Primary election financial data, I spent yesterday combing through the financials of those Ward 5 Council candidates who have declared their intent to run. I’ve compiled my initial data into a read-only spreadsheet that you can use to dissect the race, and I welcome corrections either in the comments or via email. Using the campaign filings with the Office of Campaign Finance, I have examined closely the filings of the 12 candidates who returned the forms to OCF.  I’m surprised that there are at least eight who have taken out petitions who have yet to return file with the OCF, but there are provisions that would allow a candidate not to return forms right away.

There are four campaigns that have made efforts to fundraise in the first reporting period, representing approximately 20 days of fundraising time.  Delano Hunter leads the pack with just over $20,000 across 119 donors, followed by Kenyan McDuffie with just under $17,000 across 76 donors.  Frank Wilds made a $10,000 loan to his own campaign, but tracked no donations. Bloomingdale ANC Commissioner John Salatti was fourth with $7,600 or so.  No other candidate raised more than $550.

Looking at the data in detail, it was surprising to see so much of Delano Hunter’s contributions come from outside of the District, with more than half his donors coming from zip codes outside of DC, despite some clerical errors in his filing that lists DC state marks for many addresses in Colorado, Georgia, Maryland and other states. More than 55% of the money for Hunter came from outside of DC.  Kenyan McDuffie showed similarly strong fundraising capability, bringing in over $10,000 in online donations during the three days before the filing. In addition, McDuffie lead the candidates for donations coming from both DC residents and Ward 5 residents in both donor numbers and total dollars raised. McDuffie did receive approximately 40% of his funding from outside of the District, to the tune of nearly $7,000.

Coming in fourth, John Salatti saw donations from primarily his base in Bloomingdale, with few donations coming from outside the reach of the 20001 zip code that contains Bloomingdale.

When it came to corporate money in the race, Hunter lead the pack, accepting 10 corporate donations totaling over $4,000, including bundled donations from the owners of the controversial Stadium Club gentleman’s club, and former Prince George’s County Executive Wayne Curry and his Consulting practice.  John Salatti was tied for second in corporate donations, which included a pair of bundled donations from a construction management firm and its owners, and a Development firm and its owner. McDuffie’s campaign said in a press release that they will not accept bundled donations in this race.

Full Disclosure: I am a volunteer for the Kenyan McDuffie Campaign, and a financial contributor to the campaign. No information not given to the public is available in this article.

I live and work in the District of Columbia. I write at We Love DC, a blog I helped start, I work at Technolutionary, a company I helped start, and I’m happy doing both. I enjoy watching baseball, cooking, and gardening. I grow a mean pepper, keep a clean scorebook, and wash the dishes when I’m done. Read Why I Love DC.

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2 thoughts on “First Campaign Cash Reports are Out in Ward 5 Special Election

  1. Your blog on the financial reporting was factually incorrect. While Mr. Hunter did indeed raise money outside of the DC metro area, his report gives each city, state and zip code. While 10 out of 26 of Mr. Salatti’s donations came from outside of the DC metro (which is certainly out of Bloomingdale) and 8 of those are where the DC state marks are to area codes in other states such as 80112, 98103,32162,11795, 11704,36303, 27616 & 29413. Now we the voters in Ward 5 will see if the McDuffie Campaign or the Salatti campaign will have credibility to step forward and correct this type of misleading information