Below is our final SSP Cash Power Index chart for the quarter, which looks at Senate races (both open seats and those with incumbents running for re-election). Our 1Q cash power chart is here, and our 2Q chart is here.
Once again, the same caveats apply: Many campaigns made final spending decisions before the filing deadline, so cash-on-hand figures may look artificially “low” in some cases. In other words, just looking at the final Cash Power Rankings often won’t give you a complete picture of where things stand. That’s why it’s important to consult our 3Q Senate fundraising chart in concert with this listing. Third-party expenditures are also, of course, important indicators of a race’s competitiveness.
Note that Jim Gilmore has refused to release his fundraising totals to the media (and his FEC reports are not online yet), hence our resort to mathematical symbols. But we’re pretty confident Mark Warner will retain the number one slot regardless, as he has all year.
| Cash Power Rank | 2Q Rank | State | Challenger | Party | CoH | Incumbent/ Defender | Party | CoH | Cash Power Index |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | VA | Warner | D | $3,608 | Gilmore | R |
 | |
| 2 | 2 | NM | Udall, T. | D | $1,991 | Pearce | R | $547 | 364% |
| 3 | 5 | MN | Franken | D | $2,783 | Coleman | R-inc. | $3,996 | 70% |
| 4 | 7 | AK | Begich | D | $779 | Stevens | R-inc. | $1,242 | 63% |
| 5 | 6 | LA | Kennedy | R | $1,255 | Landrieu | D-inc. | $2,395 | 52% |
| 6 | 8 | NC | Hagan | D | $880 | Dole | R-inc. | $1,716 | 51% |
| 7 | 18 | OR | Merkley | D | $766 | Smith | R-inc. | $1,503 | 51% |
| 8 | 4 | ME | Allen | D | $1,670 | Collins | R-inc. | $3,345 | 50% |
| 9 | 11 | NJ | Zimmer | R | $453 | Lautenberg | D-inc. | $922 | 49% |
| 10 | 9 | NH | Shaheen | D | $1,763 | Sununu | R-inc. | $3,629 | 49% |
| 11 | 15 | ID | LaRocco | D | $408 | Risch | R | $1,277 | 32% |
| 12 | 13 | MS | Musgrove | D | $460 | Wicker | R-inc. | $1,663 | 28% |
| 13 | 12 | OK | Rice | D | $484 | Inhofe | R-inc. | $2,024 | 24% |
| 14 | 17 | KY | Lunsford | D | $1,244 | McConnell | R-inc. | $5,766 | 22% |
| 15 | 3 | CO | Udall, M. | D | $546 | Schaffer | R | $2,734 | 20% |
| 16 | 10 | NE | Kleeb | D | $216 | Johanns | R | $1,434 | 15% |
| 17 | 19 | TX | Noriega | D | $951 | Cornyn | R-inc. | $7,322 | 13% |
| 18 | 16 | KS | Slattery | D | $145 | Roberts | R-inc. | $1,804 | 8% |
| 19 | 20 | GA | Martin | D | $92 | Chambliss | R-inc. | $1,188 | 8% |
But the awesome thing is that he’s ALREADY polling even!
Uh, what in the world happened to Mark Udall?