The numbers are in and it is a matter of what we expected and what we didn’t.  We all expected Bruce Poliquin to be able to fundraise with the best of them, but I’m not sure we expected him to double Kevin Raye out of gate.  Poliquin has also eclipsed the numbers reported by the Democrat contenders.

We expected that Kevin Raye would struggle outside of Washington County.  We didn’t expect that he would fall short of the $100,000 mark conventional wisdom predicted he would raise easily.  As many of the major donors have jumped ship to the Poliquin camp, Raye may be finding the pickings slim in the search for deep pockets.  His disappointing start will not help.

We expected that Blaine Richardson would struggle to fundraise, but we did not expect that he would already be in the negative.  While Richardson seems to relish his dark horse status, one wonders if he is the only hope that Kevin Raye has to challenge the surging Poliquin.  Richardson will hold his loyal following and Kevin Raye will hope it is enough to help him steal the nomination from Poliquin.