Tuesday night ushered in the last major primary results of the 2018 midterms season, setting the lineups for some of the most watched House and Senate races heading into November. With a few major upsets at the state level, races at the federal level followed the trends we have been observing throughout the 2018 cycle: Democratic women winning at high rates, super PACs and other outside groups using increasingly questionable tactics, and, in contested races across the board, candidates who’ve outraised their opponents finding victory more often than not.

The battle for the Senate now has most of its players on the board. As the Republican party holds a slim 50-49 majority, candidates in purple-ish states like Florida and Arizona are already receiving a great deal of attention from donors and outside groups. In Florida, the race between incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson and Governor Rick Scott has attracted over $15,000,000 in outside spending, on top of the over $50,000,000 raised by the long-incumbent Nelson and the wealthy self-funding Scott. In these elections, the most notable outside groups are the Senate Majority PAC (aligned with Democratic leadership) and the New Republican PAC—accounting for over $11.3 million combined in spending thus far.

An OpenSecrets investigation into New Republican PAC found a number of intriguing ties between the super PAC and Rick Scott’s campaign. Scott led the group before declaring his candidacy and a quick glance at staff rosters and vendor lists finds a revolving door between the super PAC, Scott’s campaign, and his Governor’s office. The website for New Republican PAC also seems to have lifted multiple sentences from Florida state government resources.

While the November competitors in the Florida Senate race were all but decided going into Tuesday’s primaries, the playing field in Arizona was a bit less certain. On the Democratic side, Rep. Kyrsten Sinema sailed easily to victory over Deedra Abboud, having outraised her $10.5 million to $81,000. While Sinema was able to spend the primary season stockpiling cash, the three-way battle between Rep. Martha McSally, former state Senator Kelli Ward and former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio on the Republican side turned particularly costly, even as a number of outside groups and mega-donors got involved in attempts to boost their efforts.

Of note in this race were the actions of “Red and Gold”—a super Pac who spent over $1.7 million attacking McSally throughout the month of August. Because the group was formed on August 1st, it will not have to reveal its funding sources until Sept. 20th, well after the August 28th primaries. However, a quick investigation finds links to Democratic leadership.

Ultimately, McSally, the top fundraiser of the three, pulled off a decisive win—earning more than 50% of the vote and finishing with over $1.9 million on hand to use against Sinema’s $2.4 million.

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House races again saw overwhelming wins by Democratic women, including former Obama administration official Nancy Soderberg in Florida’s 6th Congressional District, Kristen Carlson in Florida’s 15th, Debbie Mucarsel-Powell in Florida’s 26th and Former HHS Secretary Donna Shalala in Florida’s 27th. All four women snagged nominations after significantly outraising male opponents and—with the exception of Shalala—were the top fundraisers in their primaries.



In other competitive primaries, Rep. Darren Soto (D) was re-nominated in Florida’s 9th District and state Senator Greg Steube took the Republican nomination in the 17th district—both did so after leading their primaries in fundraising.

In Arizona, the state’s most competitive House race of the night was won by both the top fundraiser of the race and a woman when former Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick snagged the Democratic nomination in the 2nd Congressional District.

In all, of the 40 contested federal primaries that had been called by the time of filing, 32 were won by the candidate who raised the most money.

With this round of primaries complete, only Massachusetts, Delaware, New Hampshire and Rhode Island are left to hold federal primaries before the 2018 midterms come to a head on November 6th.



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