Federal cash-on-hand (CoH) disclosures help reveal some of the most important macro trends of a political cycle. Cash allows candidates to hire staffers and disseminate their message to voters; candidates without a significant war chest are at a notable disadvantage. Therefore, the quarterly disclosures provide vital information to individual campaigns about their opponents. But, we also use CoH disclosures to evaluate the macro trends of a cycle. Two weeks ago, we looked at the astronomical Presidential cash-on-hand numbers for 2020, and this week we will look at the 2020 House and Senate CoH disclosures by party. While we only have data from one quarter, there looks to be more money in the political universe than ever, and neither party looks set to have a particularly strong advantage on this metric.

Total 2019 Q1 CoH for House and Senate candidates is up $55 million from Q1 2015 and down $6 million from Q1 2017. Given the $136 million already raised by presidential hopefuls, one might assume that donors are more focused on the presidential race and less likely to give

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