Over the last 10 months, County Council member Jessica Haire has outspent County Executive Steuart Pittman by about $600,000 in the race for Anne Arundel County executive.
Since mid-January, Haire, a Republican from Edgewater, has spent around $1.6 million, including more than $516,000 in the past two months, according to campaign finance reports filed Friday. Pittman, a Democrat who ran unopposed in the primary and has spent relatively little until recently, reported expenditures of more than $777,000, according to the campaign report, which covers fundraising and spending from Aug. 23 to Oct. 24. He has now spent about $1 million on his campaign to win a second term.
Pittman spent a large chunk of his funds on media, with around $549,000 going to TV ads, online advertising and other forms of communication. He also spent about $149,000 on campaign mailers. Haire has spent more than double Pittman on media, including $1.2 million on TV ads, phone calls and other mediums. She spent about $181,000 toward mailers and around $129,000 on fundraisers.
Throughout his campaign, Pittman said he planned on spending the majority of his money in the last thirty days of the race when people were starting to tune in to the election. He held true to that strategy, spending about 78% of his total expenditures between Aug. 24 and Oct. 23.
Haire faced a longer road as she defeated four opponents in the Republican primary in July. She spent about half a million dollars in the last two months with the rest of her expenditures more evenly spread out throughout the year.
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The most recent campaign report showed Haire had raised just over $518,000. Since January, Haire has received about $1.2 million in contributions. Pittman raised about $426,000 over the last two months and $881,000 this year.
The candidates have exchanged blows over campaign contributions. Haire has been criticized for the more than $500,000 loans she made to her own campaign as well as more than $200,000 she received in donations from people associated with Halle Companies, a developer working to build a rubble landfill in Odenton.
Haire has said she’s proud to invest in her own campaign as it indicates how much she believes in her vision for the future of Anne Arundel County. As for Halle, Haire said she will be doing the firm no favors in exchange for the contributions and opposes the landfill project.
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Haire countered that Pittman has also received developer donations, pointing to a $2,500 contribution from Conifer Reality, a Rochester, New York-based developer that recently purchased five acres in Odenton to build Blue Oaks at North Odenton, a workforce housing project. Conifer received a tax benefit from the county for building the project.
Pittman responded that he was proud to be supported by a group that can help improve the lives of those in the county struggling with the cost of living.
With about a week remaining before Election Day, Nov. 8, Haire and Pittman have similar amounts of cash on hand. Pittman reported about $265,000 and Haire reported $227,000.
Eight days of early voting in the midterm election ends Thursday.