Democrat Torsella Has $584,000 For Pennsylvania Senate Race

By Greg Giroux | April 14, 2009 4:52 PM | | Comments (0)

Pennsylvania Democrat Joe Torsella, a candidate for the Senate seat of Republican incumbent Arlen Specter, raised nearly $600,000 in the final six weeks of this year's first quarter, his campaign said Tuesday.

Torsella, a former Philadelphia deputy mayor who also headed the city's National Constitution Center, began fundraising in mid-February and has $584,000 cash-on-hand.

Torsella's first-quarter receipts came almost exclusively from individual donors, according to report summary pages his campaign provided to CQ Politics. And nearly all of the money he raised from individuals was itemized, meaning that the funds came from contributors who gave at least $200.

Torsella is running for the Senate five years after he ran for the 13th District House seat in and around Philadelphia. He exhibited strong fundraising skills in that race, raising $1.4 million, but narrowly lost the Democratic primary to Allyson Y. Schwartz, who continues to serve today.

Next year's Democratic Senate primary is not yet as well-developed as the Republican primary, in which Specter and the more conservative Patrick J. Toomey, a former House member, are headed toward a rematch of their very close 2004 race.

All active candidates for Congress must file detailed first-quarter campaign reports by midnight Wednesday.

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Categories: Senate

Tags: Pennsylvania, Senate

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