With the primary approaching, see where the candidates for governor are raising their money.

The major candidates vying for the chance to be governor in 2019 reported their fundraising haul for the first quarter of the year Friday, with each raising between $700,000 and $900,000 as they face around a month left of campaigning.

It appeared as if former Auditor Adam Edelen raised the most out of any candidate when he reported $2.35 million, but a large chunk of the money came from his running mate, Louisville businessman Gill Holland, who dropped around $1.5 million on the campaign.

Personal loans also helped Rep. Robert Goforth, R-East Bernstadt, who is trying to beat Bevin in the Republican primary, keep up. He injected $750,000 into his own campaign.

House Minority Leader Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, actually brought in the most of any candidate with around $885,000, much of it coming out of Eastern Kentucky. Democratic Attorney General Andy Beshear has raised the most so far in the race with $1.8 million, but has also been in the race the longest, announcing his candidacy in July.

This was the first reporting period for Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin, who formally filed for reelection in January. Although he donated millions to his last campaign for governor, he avoided writing a check larger than $2,000 in the first months of the campaign, instead raising $813,917. He raised the most from Political Action Committees out of any candidate, bringing in around $22,000.

Here’s where the major candidates stand with less than a month left before the primary. All data comes from the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance.

Rocky Adkins (D)

Adkins, the House Minority Floor Leader, out-raised all of his opponents between January and April (not including candidate loans) by bringing in around $885,000 and bringing his total fundraising haul over the course of the campaign to around $1.5 million.

A lot of the money came from places outside of Lexington and Louisville. While people in the state’s two biggest cities donated around $106,755 to Adkins’ campaign, he raised $115,008 out of the Eastern Kentucky cities of Pikeville, Morehead and Ashland. The Eastern Kentucky amount is an indication that Adkins has a broad base of support in Appalachia, a part of the state that at one time was consistently Democratic but has voted Republican of late.

In between January and April, Adkins only got $2,000 from Political Action Committees, all of it from the United Mine Workers of America. He brought in money from several current and former state representatives including Sannie Overly, D-Paris; Russ Meyer, D-Nicholasville; Kelly Flood, D-Lexington; Mary Lou Marzian, D-Louisville; and Angie Hatton, D-Whitesburg. Marzian has since endorsed Edelen, but her endorsement came after she had given money to Adkins.

While Adkins has raised a significant amount in the race, he’s spent relatively little of it. His burn rate (the amount he’s spending compared to the amount he’s raising) is about 45.7 percent, much lower than the other Democrats in the field. He has $819,412 left in the month remaining in the primary.

Andy Beshear (D)

Beshear has been in the race in June, and currently has raised the most out of any candidate running in the primary with $1,865,026. The period between January and April was Beshear’s largest fundraising period so far, with $728,622 raised, but was still lower than his two major opponents in the primary.

The bulk of Beshear’s money came from individual donations out of the state’s bigger cities (he raised $290,422 from Louisville and Lexington) but he also brought in money from Prospect, Elizabethtown and Frankfort. The latter city could be high on the list because the Commonwealth of Kentucky was the most frequent employer for people making donation’s to Beshear’s campaign: he got $15,912.57 from 34 people who listed the Commonwealth as their employer and an additional $3,000 from six people who listed the Office of Attorney General as their employer. He also got a check for $1,000 from former Lexington mayor Jim Gray.

Beshear also brought in $17,879 from people who work at his old law firm, Stites and Harbison. He received two donations from Political Action Committees between January and April: $1,000 from the Democrats Against Wasteful Spending PAC out of Maryland and $2,000 from AT&T’s PAC. The phone and internet provider currently has a contract with Kentucky public schools that extends through 2023.

Beshear has spent about 69 percent of the money he’s raised so far and has $574,276.53 left on hand.

Adam Edelen (D)

Upon first glance, Edelen’s January through April fundraising haul looks extremely impressive with around $2.35 million since the time he got in the race in January.

That is, until you drill down and see that around $1.5 million of that money came from his running mate, Louisville businessman Gill Holland. Edelen raised around $850,000 from individual and non-itemized donations in his first few months in the race.

Staying true to his word, Edelen has not received any money from Political Action Committees in his main campaign fund (though he is supported by a PAC called Kentuckians for a Better Future). While he raised more in individual donations from Kentucky than Beshear, Edelen also had a large amount of donations from New York (around $54,370) and California (around $35,950), including a donation from actor Jon Cryer, of Two and a Half Men fame.

Edelen has gone through his money faster than any other candidate in the field and has the television ads to prove it. He’s spent around 77 percent of his total fundraising haul do far and has $533,051 left on hand.

Matt Bevin (R)

Bevin got into the gubernatorial race relatively late for an incumbent, and was outraised by two of his three potential Democratic opponents in his first few months as a candidate, bringing in $813,917.

While Bevin can inject some of his money into his campaign whenever he needs it, so far he’s only done the maximum donation of $2,000 (as has his running mate, Ralph Alvarado). Instead, he’s picked up around $777,147 from individual donations and gotten around a $29,000 injection from the Republican Party of Kentucky.

That’s coupled with around $20,000 from Political Action Committees including $2,000 from U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s Bluegrass Committee and money from companies like Acadia Health, Spectrum, Honeywell, Raytheon and Pfizer. The most common employer for his donors was the Commonwealth of Kentucky. He raised about $22,640 from 18 people who listed themselves as state employees.

Bevin raised the most out of Kentucky’s big cities, Lexington and Louisville ($211,590 from the blue islands in Kentucky) and also brought in $62,000 from Tennessee and $30,000 from Arizona.

Bevin also had some high profile individual donors, like Ken Kendrick, the managing partner of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Peter Coors, of Coors beer. But noticeably absent were members of the Republican legislature. None of the Republican leaders in the House or Senate wrote a check for Bevin.

While Bevin may not have raised as much as his potential Democratic opponents, he also hasn’t spent nearly as much, using only about 12 percent of his money so far in the race. He has the most cash on hand out of the major candidates with $715,039 left in the bank.

Robert Goforth (R)

State Rep. Robert Goforth entered the race in early January with a backpack full of attacks directed at Bevin. He’s launched a bevy of ads criticizing the governor, including one showing a classroom of children bemoaning that Bevin joked that Kentuckians are soft when several schools were canceled this winter amid frigid temperatures.

But Goforth’s financial report shows that most of the money to purchase those ads are coming from the pharmacist turned lawmaker’s own pockets. While he brought in $765,932 between January and April, 98 percent of the haul came from Goforth himself. He’s spent about $262,500 so far and has around $500,000 left for the rest of the race.

While there may have been relatively few outside donors to his campaign, there were some high-profile names. Former Supreme Court Justice Daniel Venters, who got into a public spat with Bevin over the governor’s comments about the Supreme Court, gave $150 to Goforth’s campaign. Two state representatives, Rep. Travis Brenda, R-Cartersville, and Rep. Lisa Willner, D-Louisville, each gave $100 to Goforth’s effort to take Bevin out in the primary.

This story was originally published April 29, 2019 at 11:34 AM.