In his bid for re-election, Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas is raking in the cash.
Cruz had another solid quarter of fundraising at the end of 2023, bringing in $5.5 million in October and December, according to new figures that Fox News received Thursday.
Cruz has three separate fundraising committees, and the total they brought in for the fourth quarter actually increased a bit from the $5.4 million they brought in during the third quarter of 2023.
During the second quarter, Cruz raised $4.4 million, while he raised $1.8 million in the first quarter of last year.
Compared to the similar fundraising quarter for his re-election campaign in 2018, Cruz raised $3.7 million more during the last three months of 2023.
In addition to all that money, members of the Cruz campaign said that the Ted Cruz Victory Fund raked in $1.4 million that ended up being transferred to both the Republican Party of Texas as well as the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which is the campaign arm of the GOP in the Senate.
There were 78,000 unique contributions made to the Cruz campaign in the fourth quarter of 2023, with the average contribution coming in at $36.67. Donators came from all 50 states as well as 247 of the 254 counties in Texas.
At the end of 2023, the Cruz campaign sat with more than $7.3 million in cash-on-hand.
Nick Maddux, a spokesman for the Cruz campaign, released a statement to Fox News that read:
“We continue to see an increase in energy and support from patriots across the Lone Star State and the nation. Texans are fired up to re-elect Senator Ted Cruz and ensure that Texas remains our nation’s conservative stronghold. …
“The stakes could not be higher as the radical left threatens to dismantle our Texan way of life, which is why Senator Cruz will continue blazing his campaign trail with the people of Texas to ensure that we keep Texas Texas.”
While Cruz isn’t facing any serious challengers from the Republican Party, there are a slew of Democratic candidates who have lined up to try to unseat him.
As such, Cruz said his re-election is “going to be a firefight.” Speaking to Fox News Digital last year, Cruz said aside from former President Donald Trump, “there is no Republican in the country that Democrats hate more than me.”
“[This is] something I wear as a badge of honor. There is no Republican that they would like to beat more than me.”
The last time he ran for re-election, in 2018, Cruz won his seat by a very narrow margin over Democrat Beto O’Rourke, who was serving in the U.S. House at the time.
O’Rourke outraised him by a wide margin during that run.
Cruz’s biggest apparent Democratic challenger this time around is Representative Colin Allred.
The Democrat outraised Cruz by $2 million in the second quarter of last year, though Cruz outraised Allred by about $600,000 during the third quarter.
