Republican candidate Brad Hicks has raised the most money.
Of course. Every four years the usual GOP PACS, business lobbies, upstate Republican candidates, and prominent local business leaders create million-dollar campaigns for their candidate.
The question is whether a Democrat has the credibility and connections to raise enough money to withstand the coming avalanche.
Dan Ruby argues that Cristian Mendoza Ruvalcaba is that candidate.
On April 15 I published a snapshot of the money raised by the five Democratic candidates for Senate District 3, people hoping to take the place currently held by Jeff Golden (yet another college classmate). Money is an imperfect way of seeing who has a credible campaign, but it tells us something. We see who has an active, effective campaign. We see who has political allies and who they are.
Yesterday I received an email from Ashland, Oregon, school board member Dan Ruby. He wanted me to know that his favored candidate, Ruvalcaba has raised the most money. He said it was a sign of political capability, and that political capability is the safest way for local Democrats to decide who should be the Democratic nominee.
I agree that political capability is important. I think all five Democratic candidates -- Ruvalcaba, plus Denise Krause, Tonia Moro, Kevin Stine, and Jim Crary -- have approximately the same political agenda. All want to "fix" health care. All want to stop ICE from employing brutal police tactics. All care about climate and the environment. All support reproductive rights. All care about public schools. All want Southern Oregon University to survive and thrive.
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| Dan Ruby (left) with Cristian Mendoza Ruvalcaba |
Ruvalcaba has a patron: Oregon's association of nurses. He does not yet have a wide network of individual local donors. (That is the strength of Denise Krause, who organized the campaigns to reform county government in 2022, and made a lot of friends doing so.) Nurses are a special-interest group --which is a negative -- but it is a good one to have if you are going to have a single big patron. The public likes nurses. We feel they are a "safe" group, basically "good people" in a helping profession. It is very different from how most people feel about the business PACs that fund GOP campaigns, e.g. the bank lobby, the car dealer lobby, the agricultural chemical lobby, and the timber industry lobby. We suspect predation from them; not from nurses.
Ruby put a good face on Ruvalcaba's campaign: Ruvalcaba has credibility with people who write large checks and that is necessary to win a general election. He has credibility with the right people, the nurses lobby now, and presumably other unions and policy associations later. Critics, of course, can put a negative face on Ruvalcaba's campaign: He doesn't show broad support from individual local donors, at least not yet. But Ruvalcaba met an important threshold at a time of backlash against immigrants from Latin America and Asia; he shows that a sophisticated political gatekeeper thinks that a candidate with Ruvalcaba's name and background is electable. It is a signal.
Dan Ruby was the 2024 Democratic and Progressive Party nominee for U.S. House of Representatives and currently works as a strategic consultant for healthcare, climate, and housing initiatives.
Guest Post by Dan Ruby
I am very invested in who will replace retiring and beloved public servant Senator Jeff Golden. This particular election is especially critical. Cristian Mendoza Ruvalcaba is my choice to be our next senator.
Doing the job of a legislator is one thing, but the job of getting elected is another entirely. I recognize that the Republican challenger is extraordinarily well-funded by corporate PACs and wealthy business-owner donors. Even with a district that is tilted slightly toward Democrats in registration, winning in the fall will require effectively motivating a new base, younger people and people of color. Cristian is proving that he is a capable campaigner who reaches folks who have been difficult for traditional Democratic candidates. We know that winning the general election means being able to match Brad Hicks’ money machine, at least within an order of magnitude. We see that Cristian is the only one that comes close.
The ORESTAR results are as of Thursday morning (4/30) and include the previous-year funds raised for each candidate, rounded to the nearest dollar. I didn’t disaggregate cash and in-kind.
The best representative will be someone who understands intimately the problems faced by the people in this area, through academic and career practice and lived experience. It will be someone who knows that the more diverse brains and histories you have in the room, the better the chances of success. And someone who is proving his electability by his extraordinary success in rounding up personal and financial support from experienced people in the Oregon legislature and his fellow nurses in the Oregon Nurses Association, who have contributed over $87,000 so far toward his campaign.Cristian can win the election and work for us over the next four years. That’s why I endorse Cristian Mendoza Ruvalcaba for Oregon State Senate, District 3 and urge others to give him your vote as well.
Never mind the money, the only candidate who can actually win is Denise. The others should drop out immediately and support her. Otherwise the seat will be lost.
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