Alex Wong/Getty Images
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the overwhelming favorite in her reelection race in New York’s 14th Congressional district.
- Her Republican opponent, John Cummings has still raised $9.6 million — seemingly a sign of how keen conservatives are to challenge her.
- “I guarantee you 75% of his contributors don’t know anything about him,” a Republican strategist told The New York Times.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is widely expected to win reelection next month as the US Representative for New York’s 14th district.
Her Republican challenger, John Cummings, has still managed to raise $9.6 million, in a sign of how desperate her critics are to beat her, The New York Times reported on Saturday.
“I guarantee you 75% of his contributors don’t know anything about him,” Tom Doherty, a Republican strategist, told the newspaper of Cummings, a former Bronx schoolteacher and police officer.
“The people that are interested in that race financially are giving because it’s AOC,” he said.
Ocasio-Cortez, who has raised $17.3 million so far, champions progressive policies such as public healthcare, tuition-free public college, the abolition of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the rollout of a Green New Deal that would transform the US economy to combat climate change and protect the environment.
The lawmaker's bold proposals have polarized Americans, winning her passionate support among liberals and making her a popular target for conservatives.
The result is that more money has poured into backing her and her opponents than in any House of Representatives race in the country bar one, The New York Times said.
More then $30 million has flowed into the campaign, most of it going to Ocasio-Cortez and Cummings.
Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, a former CNBC anchor who lost to Ocasio-Cortez in the Democratic primary, has also raised $2.4 million and loaned $1 million to her campaign in order to run against Ocasio-Cortez again as the candidate for the Serve America Movement.
Cummings' campaign staff knew they could capitalize on Ocasio-Cortez's public profile to raise money from across the country.
"I just sensed that national fund-raising against someone like AOC would be successful," Chapin Fay, Cummings' campaign manager, told The New York Times.