The Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, the Democratic challengers in the Senate runoffs in Georgia, have each raised more than $100 million since October.
Enormous sums that surpassed their Republican opponents by a significant margin and underscored Democrats’ confidence after recent gains the party has made in the state and their hopes that they might capture the Senate.
The contests have drawn a surge of attention and investment from outside of Georgia, given the stakes, and the campaigning has only intensified in the final weeks before the runoff, which is scheduled for Jan. 5.
Senator David Perdue, one of the Republican incumbents, raised $68 million in the period between Oct. 15 and Dec. 16, according to reports to the Federal Election Commission.
Senator Kelly Loeffler, the other Republican, raised close to $64 million during that period.
Ossoff, who is running against Perdue, became the best-funded Senate candidate in history after pulling in $106.7 million, according to the filings, and Warnock, who is challenging Loeffler, has raised $103.3 million.
The Democrats’ haul was powered in large part by a flurry of smaller donations collected from across the country, filings show, with nearly half of the funds coming from people who donated less than $200.
Ossoff, who runs a media production company, spent $93.5 million during that period and had $17.4 million in cash on hand, and Warnock, the pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, spent $86.1 million and had $22.7 million in cash on hand.
Perdue spent $57.8 million and had $16 million in cash, and Loeffler spent $48.6 million and had $21.2 million in cash on hand.
Loeffler, one of the wealthiest members of the Senate, was the only candidate to give to his or her own campaign, donating $333,200 — far less than the $23 million of her own money she spent on the general election run.
The numbers in the filings only affirm a level of investment that has been plainly visible to Georgia voters for months.
Campaign ads fill virtually every commercial break on television and radio.
The spending has even spilled over state lines, as the candidates and outside groups have bought time in markets like Jacksonville, Fla., and Chattanooga, Tenn., to reach Georgia voters living nearby.
Democrats have been buoyed by a string of recent success in a state that had until recently been reliably Republican.
President-elect Joe Biden was the first Democratic presidential candidate to win in Georgia since 1992.
Biden and President Trump have traveled to campaign for their party’s candidates.
Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and Ivanka Trump, the president’s eldest daughter, both made campaign stops in Georgia last week.
L. Lin Wood, a conservative attorney and staunch Trump ally, suggested Friday that Perdue and Loeffler, should be arrested.
Wood, who has spent the last few weeks spreading debunked allegations of voter fraud, also tweeted out an outlined plan to boycott the state’s Senate runoff race, telling Republicans to “break” the election by refusing to vote.
“I have received much criticism for demanding that GA fix the 11/3 fraud before we vote in 1/5 runoff,” Wood tweeted on Friday. “In full disclosure, I am not a fan of any of the 4 candidates in Senate runoff. Communists or China compromised in my opinion.”
“I just want an HONEST election. Don’t you?” he added before tweeting a diagram summarizing a boycott plan.
Wood has previously alleged that voting machines provided by the company Dominion Voting Systems and were used in the general election switched votes from Trump to Biden.
The diagram attached to Wood’s tweet on Friday repeated these claims, alleging that “the Georgia election fraud committed by anti-Trump RINOs Brian Kemp, Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue against President Trump and Doug Collins was accomplished using the Dominion Voting Systems Algorithm.”
“The algorithm was never designed for unheard-of levels of GOP non-participation. The algorithm will steal votes from the GOP, but there will be so few in heavily Democratic precincts that GOP vote totals will go negative,” the diagram states.
“The fraud will be so obvious, SCOTUS can then invalidate the presidential election. Real conservative senators can then be appointed, after Kemp, Perdue and Loeffler’s arrest,” it added.
This is not the first time Wood, who also represented Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse, has called for a boycott of the runoff election.
The Trump ally has spent weeks baselessly accusing Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems, two companies that make voting equipment and software, of rigging the election alongside conspiracy-theorist lawyer Sidney Powell.
Both Wood and Powell have been unable to support their claims of rigged Dominion voting machines.
If the Democrats win both races, the Senate majority will be split 50/50 between the two parties, leaving the final tie-breaking vote to Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
Michelle Obama is due to campaign virtually in the state in a drive-in concert put on by her organization When We All Vote to mobilize voters.
Celebrate Georgia! on January 3 will also feature performances by Rick Ross, Jack Harlow, Pastor Troy and Monica.