Kathleen Matthews

Matthews On Gun Control 

Jonathan Guns, Maryland CD8

Kathleen Matthews writes in the Huffington Post on her support for President Obama’s gun control executive orders yesterday.

This is the issue that now animates my campaign for Congress in Maryland, where I am running for the open seat vacated by Congressman Chris Van Hollen, who is running for the U.S. Senate. My 8-point plan includes a national registry on gun and ammunition sales, requiring a universal 7-day waiting period on background checks on ammunition and gun sales, banning assault weapons, backing public safety campaigns and child safety education, and supporting state-based solutions such as Maryland’s ban on semi-automatic handguns and semi-automatic rifles. We also need to provide the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms with the personnel to enforce the law and put more money into mental health care, since two out of three gun deaths are from suicides. Many of these ideas were embraced by President Obama today in his executive action. But he also said Congress must act, too, to ensure that we reclaim our streets for law-abiding citizens and make sure we protect people who might turn guns on themselves.

The president is absolutely right when he says this is a political choice we have made to allow these horrendous and tragic events to happen. It is in our power to save thousands of lives. We have the technology and legislative ability to do so. But Congress has lacked the backbone and political will to stand up to the gun lobby and say “no more.” Fortunately, we have a president who, with tears in his eyes, has said “no more” Sandy Hooks. No more Auroras. No more Navy Yards. No more Charlestons. No more San Bernardinos. And, in 2016, we need to elect people to Congress who will do the same. Let’s get it done!

The Year Of The Woman

Jonathan Maryland CD4, Maryland CD8, Maryland Senate, Women's Issues , ,

One day into the New Year, and the branding has already begun. It’s the Year of the Woman in Maryland politics. 

Women voters in Maryland are being targeted with television ads about the two candidates running in the state’s Democratic primary for U.S. Senate, underscoring the battle underway for a demographic that will play a key role in choosing a successor to Barbara A. Mikulski, the pathbreaking dean of the Senate women.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Montgomery County began airing a new commercial this week promoting his record on women’s issues. The spot comes as a powerful national women’s group with a history in Maryland politics is running $1 million in advertising for his primary opponent, Rep. Donna F. Edwards of Prince George’s County.

In races across the state, candidates are working aggressively to reach women, who typically account for about 60 percent of the turnout in Maryland Democratic primaries — and who observers believe will be energized by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign to vote in larger numbers this year.

“There are many women who are looking at her candidacy as historic,” said Steve Raabe, president of the Annapolis-based polling firm OpinionWorks. “That certainly isn’t going to hurt the turnout among women.”

And it’s not just the Senate race, either. It’s happening in both open House races as well.

In the 8th Congressional District, which includes parts of Montgomery, Frederick and Carroll counties, former television news anchor Kathleen Matthews focused her first position paper on what she described as women’s issues, including paid family leave and equal pay.

State Sen. Jamie Raskin, also running for the Democratic nomination in the 8th District, announced a group of female supporters early in his campaign that will help organize other women to back the campaign.

Several women’s political organizations, meanwhile, have endorsed state Del. Joseline Peña-Melnyk in her bid in the 4th Congressional District, which includes Anne Arundel and Prince George’s counties. Another candidate in the 4th, former Prince George’s County State’s Attorney Glenn Ivey, launched a group of women supporters in December.

Given the statistics on turnout, appealing to women is critical. Moreover, there is a natural fit between certain issues that matter  to women - pay equity, family leave, child care - and economic justice issues generally that are of critical importance to the increasing progressive left wing of the party’s electorate. If you’re a candidate with a real and meaningful track record on these issues, then you’re in the game.

But let’s be brutally honest in a way that John Fritze perhaps can’t be: being a female candidate in 2016 is an advantage. It’s Donna Edwards’ calling card - if she wins, it will be because she argues that she brings a unique perspective as a black woman (race isn’t exactly relevant, either, prtixularly in the Senate contest). Kathleen Matthews and Joseline Pena-Melnyk are surging because they’re working hard and running good campaigns, but part of their appeal is that they’re women.

It’s a fine line. Nobody should be elected solely because of their identity: race, gender, ethnicity, generational, etc. But it is a factor. 

“Vote for me because I understand what it’s like to be a woman.”

“We need more voices that will speak to women’s issues and concerns.”

If being a woman is all you’ve got, then you’re not going to succeed. But the women in all three races have extensive and impressive track records, and being women only enhances that appeal. How it all plays out in the end will be one of the key story lines between now and April 26.

Matthews Endorses Clinton

Jonathan Maryland CD8, President 2016 ,

Yes, it would be more newsworthy the other way around, but here’s the press release from Matthews:

MD-8 Democratic Congressional Candidate Kathleen Matthews Endorses Hillary Clinton

Today MD-8 Democratic candidate Kathleen Matthews publicly endorsed Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton for President of the United States. Praising Clinton’s foreign and domestic policy experience, in addition to her record as a lifelong advocate for America’s working families, Matthews said Hillary Clinton would be the best possible President for our time. Matthews and Clinton have both been endorsed by EMILY’s List, the national organization dedicated to electing more pro-choice Democratic women.
Here is Matthews’ full statement:
“In 1920, this country ratified the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution granting women the right to vote. Nearly a century later, America has the opportunity to break down another barrier to full equality and respect by electing Hillary Clinton President of the United States.
I say this with the total conviction that Hillary Clinton, regardless of her gender, regardless of the significant history we can make next November, would be the best possible President for our time.
I ask you to have the courage to share this decision with me. There is no other progressive out there today running for President on a record such as Hillary’s: eight years as First Lady, eight as a U.S. senator, four as Secretary of State. Not only does she bring the most extensive experience in foreign policy and national security matters, Hillary Clinton has spent a lifetime championing the progressive causes of healthcare, education, child development, and, of course, gender equality.
I have been fortunate to work with Hillary Clinton on State Department initiatives to enhance economic opportunity for women around the world, to create jobs in Haiti following the devastating earthquake, and to promote youth employment here in America with the Clinton Global Initiative.
And as a reporter and later in my business career, I’ve seen she has the talent, the commitment, the seriousness of mind and emotion to be not only the first woman President but one of the great Presidents. It’s up to us to make it happen.
I endorse Hillary Clinton for President of the United States and expect to be forever proud that I did and did so now.”

BREAKING: Matthews Endorsed By EMILY’s List

Jonathan Endorsements, Maryland CD8 ,

One of the biggest shoes in the endorsement closet dropped early this morning. Matthews press release:

Today, EMILY’s List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, endorsed progressive Kathleen Matthews, who’s running to continue her work fighting for women and families in Congress in Maryland’s Eighth District.

“Kathleen Matthews is a lifelong advocate for women and families and a dynamic leader who will fight for progressive change in Congress,” said Stephanie Schriock, president of EMILY’s List. “As a news anchor at WJLA-TV, she put a spotlight on issues affecting women and families – jobs, education, health care, and equality in the workplace – and as an executive, she spearheaded efforts to advance women’s careers and women-owned businesses around the world. Maryland’s Eighth District has never elected a Democratic woman to Congress, and the EMILY’s List community is thrilled to endorse Kathleen Matthews: a pro-choice leader fighting for Planned Parenthood and deeply committed to helping Maryland working families get a fair shot.”

EMILY’s List has raised over $400 million to support pro-choice Democratic women candidates – making it one of the most successful political organizations ever. Since it’s founding in 1985, they have trained over 9,000 women to run for office and helped elect over 100 women to the House and 19 women to the Senate, including Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski.

“I have long admired EMILY’s List and the women candidates they have promoted, like Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski, who was the first woman the organization helped elect in 1986. I share their values of putting women and families first and will fight to protect a woman’s right to choose, ensure equal pay for equal work, and protect Planned Parenthood funding,” said Kathleen Matthews. “I am honored by their support and confidence in my candidacy, and this endorsement adds tremendous momentum to our campaign six months before the primary election.”

The big question: how much money comes with this endorsement? Not all EL endorsements are created equal. We’ll have to wait and see, but my sense is this one is going to come with a lot of money.

Seventh State Follies [UPDATED]

Jonathan Fact Checker, Fundraising, Maryland CD8 , ,

[UPDATE] An astute reader points out that per Seventh State (still not linking), the post was actually a guest blog by Adam Pagnucco. I will say two things: first, the email sent out to subscribers made no mention of Pagnucco but credited the story solely to David Lublin. So my assumption was understandable, I submit.  

Second, in case it’s not clear, I do not have a great deal of respect for David Lublin as a blogger. I think he has undisclosed agendas (in his near-obsession with the Town of Chevy Chase elections this year he never once disclosed his status as the former mayor of the town and his having been a leading opponent of the Purple Line.

I also don’t like him because he smeared me in 2014, both on his own and by bringing on John Gallagher, who appeared to have been hired solely to attack me and a few others. I find that kind of blogging obnoxious and sleazy, and I don’t engage in it. My one consolation is that Lublin appears to be just as much of a hack as ever in 2015.

I don’t have as much of a beef with Adam Pagnucco. While we’ve had our share of disagreements over the years, I generally find him to be a first rate researcher and a good analyst of data. What I do believe, based on some of his recent work, is that he seems loath to give his readers enough information to replicate his analysis. I wish he’d do more of that, but otherwise I think his work is good.

Needless to say, I don’t think that about today’s piece. Quite frankly, it’s crap. But I wouldn’t have written what I wrote in the same tone if I knew it was Pagnucco rather than Lublin behind it. I would have been less snarky and less pissy, to be honest, for the above reasons. And I have no axe to grind with Pagnucco, and I hope he recognizes that. I know he usually writes the “data” pieces for Lublin, but this one was so bad it made it easier for me to believe that Lublin wrote it and more importantly here, that Pagnucco didn’t. Maybe that’s both self-justification and piling on Lublin, but it happens to be true. I don’t know when Lublin updated his post to refer to Pagnucco, so I don’t know that even if I checked I would have gotten the right information. But I didn’t check, and I should have.
So taking everything into account, I’m not going to amend what I wrote. That wouldn’t be honest, and I pride myself on that. But I’m putting this update right up on top so people know exactly what’s what and all that. And I’ve made my biases as clear as I can. Read the rest with this update in mind. Thanks for reading.

ORIGINAL POST FOLLOWS:

Maybe if David Lublin stopped pretending that Maryland Scramble didn’t exist, he might have written a better CD8 fundraising story this morning (no links, I don’t steer traffic to bloggers who won’t acknowledge my existence). Instead, he’s written a story that any reader here could have told him was poorly reasoned and weakly sourced, and that much of his data had been previously published by me, among others. Moreover, by the time Lublin’s story came out, new developments rendered some of his key assumptions inoperative, which he would have known had he read the several posts I wrote over the past two days about Mayday. Overall, a pretty poor performance, Professor. I’d give it a C-.

Data: much of his top line data is repetitive of my October 16 post, and the spreadsheet accompanying it is, I would not so humbly suggest, more informative with far fewer numbers on the page. With multiple quarters of data, it’s better to show the progress of the candidates over time, which in this case shows the major changes that took place in the third quarter. Lublin’s use of only aggregate data masks the importance of the most recent quarter in trying to project out future trends. It also may be why he persists in calling the $200,000 margin between Matthews and Raskin “close,” when in fact it was generated completely during one quarter, which means if that trend continues, it won’t be close at all by the end of the campaign. My data shows this very clearly. Similarly, Lublin aggregates burn rate data for the entire year, when the quarter by quarter data shows that both Matthews and Raskin geared up substantially in the third quarter. It was Q2 when Matthews spent very little, which makes sense considering that she did not enter the race until June 3, less than a month before the end of the quarter. In Q3, her donations went up, Raskin’s went down by $175K, all while he spent more money than she did. All of this gets ignored by Lublin - I have to admire his ability to ignore facts which don’t suit his preferred narrative.

Lublin has a chart claiming to represent average donations, but it’s not one that I could replicate. How many donations did each candidate receive? Which ones is Lublin including? We don’t know.

Lublin has a chart looking at contributions for the general election, which can’t be used during the primary campaign. He fails to note, however, that such contributions are always from max-out donors who want to give more than the $2700 allowed for the primary. So when he notes that Raskin has $67K in “general election” money to Matthews’ $50K, that means that his super big donors gave more than Matthews’ did. Which Lublin doesn’t mention, presumably because it doesn’t fit his preordained narrative of rich Kathleen versus grassroots Jamie. I also think that it would be far more informative to show general election “dead money” as a percentage of cash on hand, not as a percentage of a concocted number that doesn’t include unitemized individual contributions. Looked at this way, 5.7% of Matthews’ cash on hand is dead money, while dead money constitutes 9.8% of Raskin’s COH - 72% higher than Matthews.

I’ve written extensively about how I believe the fixation with in-state versus out of state campaign contributions is not an argument that is going to persuade anyone other than already zealously committed partisans. Lublin doesn’t begin to try to counter my arguments - a problem when you ignore the fact that I’m here, chirping away on a daily basis - but again proceeds from the preconception that out of state money is bad, bad, bad. Hence the multiple charts harping on this non-issue. Question for Lublin and like-minded partisans: if out of state money is so bad, why does Raskin take it? He knows how to draw such lines - he doesn’t take corporate, PAC or partnership money. So the fact that he takes out of state money at all means that he sees it very differently from other categories of donations. Which means that both Raskin and his supporters like Lublin should really stop harping on this issue, because it’s just not a good argument they’re making.

Where things really fall apart for Lublin is in his “takeaways from the data.” The first two paragraphs have to win some kind of prize for wrongness - every single assertion is either unrelated to the data, not supported by the data, or demonstrably wrong. Let’s go through it.

“Kathleen Matthews’ campaign was predicated on blowing away the rest of the field in fundraising.” There’s nothing in the data to show this, and Lublin doesn’t bother to even attempt to source it. It’s an assumption - an assumption that gives Lublin away as a Raskin fanboy. Money bad, Kathleen has money, Kathleen bad. Not exactly deep thinking there. I think many people believed at the outset that Raskin would raise all the money, that Matthews would get a few big contributions from her rich friends, and that she would be exposed as a weak candidate. So much for the conventional wisdom, hmmmm?

“That is happening with the notable exception of Senator Jamie Raskin, who has so far remained close to her.” As I said above, a $200,000 COH gap generated in one quarter is not “close.” Raskin raised $175,000 less in Q3 than Q2, and still spent more than Matthews. Not good. I wrote in my October 16 post that Raskin could turn this around, but there is no data to suggest that this will happen. Or that it won’t. That’s why I said that the fourth quarter is critical. Lublin thinks all is well, which is just more preaching to the converted.

“One factor that could change that is if Matthews’ wealthy supporters open a Super PAC on her behalf. Super PACs are not supposed to coordinate directly with candidate campaigns, but they can raise unlimited contributions and spend them on both positive and negative communication. One can easily imagine twenty Matthews supporters each chipping in $100,000, thereby instantaneously bringing an extra $2 million into the race for their candidate.” Here, Lublin stops trying to base his “analysis” on the data and drops any pretense of objectivity. He spins a purely conjectural vision of a Matthews super PAC coming in and having an impact on the race. Hey, Dave, I’ve got a different vision: “one can easily imagine a pro-Raskin campaign finance reform super PAC blundering into CD8 parroting precisely the arguments of the Raskin campaign, raising the specter of illegal coordination and outside influence, while simultaneously undercutting arguments about out or state money and damaging if not destroying the carefully crafted image of Raskin as a good government, grassroots, campaign finance reform advocate kind of guy.” Oh, wait, mine already happened. My bad, sorry. Maybe if you read my stuff . . . oh, never mind.

“Senator Raskin’s strategy of community organizing is paying off big-time for his fundraising. He is leading or nearly tied in fundraising in every populous CD8 community except Chevy Chase and his relatively low average contribution rate leaves plenty of room for repeat contributions. His two biggest challenges are countering Matthews’ likely appeal to women and what happens to his campaign once he has to go back to Annapolis for session next January.” Paying off big time? In what universe? He’s $200,000 behind. Oh, wait, I forgot, only in-state contributions count, cause those other ones are icky and have cooties. News flash: out of state dollars spend precisely the same as in-state. So to say Raskin is “leading or nearly tied in fundraising” is delusional. Money is money, no matter how distasteful the inside baseball guys like Lublin might see it.

To be fair, the last sentence is actually accurate: Matthews is likely to receive the endorsement of EMILY’s List, which will bring in - oh dear - more outside money. Of course, it’s hard to criticize that source of money without further alienating a crucial chunk of voters, so Lublin doesn’t go down that road. And the challenge of simultaneously being a candidate and a legislator is a real and important issue that has so far not received much public attention. I have my views on the subject but this post is already long enough, so I’ll save that for another day.

Bottom line: just because someone puts up a bunch of charts with numbers doesn’t make the “analysis” any better. Suspect numbers, errors and omissions, and a conclusion that has almost no relationship to what has come before but which strips away any pretense of objectivity that “Professor”Lublin clearly aspires to. That’s MY takeaway, and on second thought, I think my grade of C- was very, very generous.

CD8 Heats Up

Jonathan Campaign Finance Reform, Maryland CD8 , ,

The candidates and the super PAC have been boating away at each other all afternoon. John Fritze in the Sun assesses the impact of the Mayday super PAC ad on behalf of Jamie Raskin in CD8.

Kathleen Matthews’ campaign for Congress fired back Tuesday at a super PAC supporting state Sen. Jamie Raskin, arguing the group focused on campaign finance reform was making “outrageous false claims.”

Noting Raskin’s record on campaign finance as a member of the state legislature, Mayday PAC held an event in Takoma Park on Monday to back his candidacy. The group was founded as a “super PAC to end all super PACs,” supporting candidates who embrace changes to campaign funding.
But as the group worked to lift Raskin up, it also took several hard swings at Matthews. In a web video released Monday, Mayday CEO and former New York gubernatorial candidate Zephyr Teachout said Matthews “has been a corporate lobbyist in D.C.”
Matthews was never a registered lobbyist for Marriott. The former WJLA-TV reporter and anchor did oversee the division at the Bethesda-based company that handled both communications and government affairs.
“This week supporters of Jamie Raskin launched the first negative attack of the campaign,” the Matthews campaign wrote in an email to supporters. “Hiding behind an out-of-state super PAC, they’re distorting Kathleen’s record and making outrageous false claims.”
Matthews’ email to supporters focuses its ire at Raskin but, by law, super PACs operate independently of the campaigns they are supporting. Another proof Raskin wasn’t coordinating his message with the PAC: His camp was trying to pitch a story about a different endorsement — that of Montgomery County Del. Kathleen M. Dumais — to reporters on the same day.

The Raskin campaign blasted right back.

 Raskin’s campaign said it was not involved with the attacks.

“Senator Raskin, as the Matthews campaign knows, has nothing to do, and will have nothing to do, with this or any other super PAC in America,” campaign manager Marshall Cohen said in a statement. “But Jamie welcomes the opportunity to have a public discussion with Ms. Matthews about his extensive record as a campaign finance reform advocate and his proposals to abolish corporate dark money in our elections, as well as any new ideas she wants to present.”
The back-and-forth represents a break from the mostly genteel tone that has dominated the 8th District race so far — and it underscores the impact outside groups can have, even in primary elections. Mayday raised $11 million in the 2014 cycle, and it has committed to raising at least $100,000 for Raskin.

There’s some stuff in the middle about Mayday, which inaccurately referred to Matthews as a lobbyist, then tried to defend it, then brought up the months old “but, but she gave to Roy Blunt” silliness. When the arguments of the super PAC begin to become indistinguishable from those being made by the candidate, voters in Democratic primaries tend to get really aggravated. As to the rest of this “delicious irony,” I said what I had to say, and I stand by it. No good will come to Jamie Raskin from this group’s “help.”

Mayday Comes To CD8

Jonathan Campaign Ads, Maryland CD8 , ,

Yesterday I wrote about Mayday, the campaign finance reform super PAC. Today, they’ve come riding into CD8 with an ad for Jamie Raskin, an ad which also attacks Kathleen Matthews repeatedly by name. I said it yesterday and I’ll say it again. No good will come to Raskin from this clueless group.

Even before I saw the video, Matthews has issued a response, an email from campaign manager Ethan Susseles calling out Raskin for a “negative attack” and seeking support.

  
Look, the fact is that money is money. A dollar from Maryland spends no better than a dollar from Wisconsin. And Raskin’s argument isn’t that Matthews’ money is tainted by who it’s from, only where - as we say down in Texas, “it ain’t from around these parts.” That argument is way too subtle for anyone not already in the tank for Jamie to care about.

Not to mention, when the guy with the good government halo over his head strikes the first negative blow, that’s not going to sit well with many people. Following it up with a super PAC making the attack explicit is even more risky. We’ll see how it shakes out in the end.

Reading The Reports

Jonathan Fundraising, Maryland CD8 ,

Two articles in the past day on who’s been giving to CD8 candidates Jamie Raskin and Kathleen Matthews, one in the Post and one in Bethesda Magazine. Both are worth a read.

The Post report does suffer from one flaw. It combines donors from the second quarter - which were previously reported, both by me and others, with new information from the third quarter reports. So for instance, Bill Turque reports the three month old news that Capitals and Wizards owned Ted Leonsis donated $5,400 to Kathleen Matthews and Orioles owner Peter Angelos donated the same amount to Jamie Raskin. Both donations were from the second quarter, as your humble correspondent reported on July 16.

That said, there’s some interesting info in the Post report.

Some of the names on Matthews’s donor report read like a class reunion of Clinton administration figures, most of whom remain active in law, lobbying or business. They include former chief of staff Thomas F. “Mack” McLarty III and his wife, Donna ($5,400); former White House counsel Jack Quinn ($1,000); former Commerce secretary and later Obama chief of staff William M. Daley ($2,700); campaign adviser Mandy Grunwald; former White House special counsel Gregory Craig ($2,700); former deputy attorney general Jamie S. Gorelick ($2,700); Clinton family friend and political troubleshooter Vernon Jordan ($2,000); and Melanne Verveer, adviser to both President Clinton and first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton ($500).

Matthews, who is married to former Democratic congressional staffer and MSNBC “Hardball” host Chris Matthews, also drew support from some of the District’s biggest corporate names, including Ted Leonsis, owner of the Wizards, Mystics and Capitals ($5,400); AOL founder James V. Kimsey ($1,000); and former Washington Post publisher Katharine Weymouth ($2,700).

A former executive vice president for global communication and public affairs at Marriott International, Matthews collected at least $37,000 from Marriott executives and spouses, filings show. That included donations from Marriott International chairman J.W. Marriott Jr. and chief executive Arne M. Sorenson. Jonathan M. Tisch, chairman of Loews Hotels, contributed $2,700.

Matthews also received donations from industry political action committees that include the American Gaming Association PAC ($2,500) and the American Hotel and Lodging Association PAC ($5,000).

Raskin has some famous names on his reports as well.

Many of his contributions came from lawyers and academics, including University of Maryland historian and economist Gar Alperovitz ($500); former Harvard dean Joseph J. McCarthy ($350); and D.C. Council member and George Washington University law professor Mary M. Cheh ($250). Among the larger contributors from the legal community was lawyer and Baltimore Orioles owner Peter G. Angelos ($5,400).

Raskin, who is married to Deputy Treasury Secretary Sarah Bloom Raskin, also did well with Montgomery County’s business and real estate development sector, with donations from Tower Companies partner Gary M. Abramson ($1,000); hotel executive Stewart Bainum Jr. and his wife, Sandra ($5,400 apiece); and property manager and developer Adam Bernstein ($2,700). Raskin’s campaign treasurer is Miti Figueredo, a former Montgomery County Council staffer and now vice president for public affairs for the Chevy Chase Land Company.

The Bethesda Magazine report draws similar conclusions, dishing some famous names and then summing up as follows:

They’re all part of a large network of political, business and media contacts in the Washington area and across the country that has been accumulated by Matthews—a former local news anchor and Marriott International executive—and her husband, MSNBC talk show host and former congressional aide Chris Matthews. In the latest filing, the donations from that network enabled Matthews to outdistance her leading rival, state Sen. Jamie Raskin of Takoma Park, in fundraising by almost $190,000—$564,000 for Matthews to $375,000 for Raskin—in the three-month period ending Sept. 30. It left Matthews with nearly $892,000 in the bank, as compared to $694,000 in Raskin’s campaign treasury.

On to the fourth quarter!

BREAKING: Matthews: $560K, $891K COH

Jonathan Fundraising, Maryland CD8

The dam has burst. Press release from Kathleen Matthews:

In the Federal Elections Commission filing to be made public today, Maryland 8th District candidate Kathleen Matthews announced she raised $564,220.99 in the 3rd quarter bringing the total raised for the campaign to $1,065,326.98. Her campaign reported that they have $891,716.26 in the bank as of September 30th.

“It is clear that the voters of this area want a progressive woman to represent them in Congress and be a strong voice for working families and an economy that works for all people,” said Matthews. “I am grateful to my supporters and proud to stand up for the issues they care about, like tougher gun safety laws to stop the violence, protecting a women’s right to choose, and supporting policies to protect our environment and reduce carbon emissions.”

“Our campaign is swinging into full gear now as we meet with community leaders, attend issues-driven candidate forums, greet voters at Metro stops, and host meet and greets in every corner of the 8th District,” said campaign manager Ethan Susseles. “It’s clear that we have the strong support of a diverse coalition of voters and donors, and real momentum as we move into the next phase of this campaign.” 

For 30 years, Kathleen Matthews was a local news producer, reporter and anchor. In 2006, she joined Marriott International as Chief Communications and Public Affairs Officer where she led the company’s sustainability strategy and served on Marriott’s Global Diversity and Inclusion Council, which promoted equality and opportunity for women, LGBT, and minority communities. She is a working mom who raised her three children in Montgomery County.

UPDATE: I was rushing to get the Matthews numbers up and missed the fact that her burn rate was, like Raskin’s, kind of on the high side. She spent around $176,000 in the third quarter (to Raskin’s $165K), but she also raised $200,000 more than he did, so her burn rate was 31% as compared to his 44%.