Story by Chris Graham
The 24th Senate District Republican Party nomination sure did turn out to be expensive.
Winning candidate Emmett Hanger spent more than a quarter of a million dollars to secure the party nod, according to a campaign-finance report filed with the State Board of Elections on Monday.
Hanger, a three-term incumbent, was only able to outspend challenger Scott Sayre by a small margin, according to an analysis of the reports filed by both candidates this week.
Sayre, who received 47 percent of the vote in the June 12 primary in the 24th, spent $248,842 on his campaign, according to his campaign report, which covered activity through the end of the month of June.
Hanger’s campaign had spent $259,620 through June 30 – and had $83,874.08 on hand for the fall race with Democrat David Cox and Libertarian Arin Sime.
Cox, a late entrant into the 24th District race, had raised $4,632 for his campaign as of June 30, according to a report filed by his campaign on Monday.
Sime had raised $31,626 and spent $21,949 as of June 30 – and had just under $10,000 on hand at the end of last month.
Chris Graham is the executive editor of The Augusta Free Press.