Port: Trygve Hammer ties Julie Fedorchak in last quarterly fundraising report of U.S. House race

MINOT — If Trygve Hammer, the nominated candidate of the Democratic-NPL, loses North Dakota's U.S. House race, it won't be for want of resources.

Hammer has continued his strong trend by essentially tying his Republican opponent, Julie Fedorchak, in third-quarter fundraising. Hammer posted a haul of $440,680.37 for the third quarter of 2024, breaking the $1 million mark. His campaign committee's total fundraising for the 2024 cycle stands at $1,000,834.54.

That last figure includes $994,230.20 in individual contributions and $6,420 from political parties and political action committees.

It's an impressive haul. In fact, Hammer's fundraising seems to be accelerating.

He raised over $172,000 in the second quarter, and ended that reporting period with $162,000 in cash on hand. He raised 2.5 times more in the third quarter than the second quarter, and finished the third quarter with $220,429.72 in cash, a roughly 36% increase.

But Fedorchak edged out Hammer in the third quarter, and still enjoys a substantial advantage in funds. Her October quarterly report shows she raised $452,391.65 — just $11,711.28 more than Hammer — but in the cycle to date, she has raised a total of $1,840,945.01.

She ended the third quarter with $539,120.58 in cash on hand, more than double Hammer's total. And, keep in mind, campaigns aren't won by raising campaign dollars. They're won by spending those dollars on winning over voters, and then getting those voters to the polls.

To date, Fedorchak's campaign has spent over $1.2 million on operations. Hammer's campaign has spent just over $718,000.

Still, give Hammer credit for performing better than any Democrat since former Rep. Earl Pomeroy last ran for reelection in 2010.

In 2022, Mark Haugen, the Democratic-NPL's House candidate, and former Miss America Cara Mund, the independent candidate who was the de facto Democratic-NPL candidate after Haugen was pushed out of the race, combined to raise less than $200,000 for the entire cycle.

In 2020, Democratic House candidate Zach Raknerud raised less than $30,000.

The last time the Democrats had a candidate who raised money at the scale Hammer has in 2024 was 2018, when former state lawmaker Mac Schneider (currently serving a term as North Dakota U.S. attorney) raised over $761,000 for the entire cycle. Hammer has surpassed that mark by a substantial amount.

Though, as competitive as he's made this race in terms of fundraising, the polls don't show it to be a particularly close one. A poll commissioned by Fedorchak (in conjunction with two other statewide Republican campaigns) showed her leading Hammer by 29 points, 58% to 29%.

A poll sponsored by the North Dakota News Cooperative — conducted by the same pollster, albeit with a different methodology that resulted in a larger share of the sample identifying as undecided — showed Fedorchak winning 53% to 28%.

Hammer is a strong candidate, but the fundamentals of this race are against him. The political winds in North Dakota may be shifting, but they haven't shifted that much.

Editor's note: This column was edited at 2:10 p.m. Tuesday afternoon to include numbers from joint fundraising committees. Including those funds, Fedorchak raised slightly more than Hammer. The column has been edited to reflect the correct information.