Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) raised nearly $1.5 million in the final three months of 2022, lifting her campaign fund to a record $4.4 million at the start of 2023, according to her campaign.

The amount — more than $1.4 million more than Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) had at the outset of 2021, the year before her re-election campaign — gives the incumbent Democrat a substantial headstart over potential Republican challengers. 

Specifics of Rosen’s quarterly fundraising, including detailed information on how much money came from individual donors, were not immediately available, pending a Federal Election Commission (FEC) filing deadline Tuesday. 

Rosen’s seat is one of eight in which Democrats are playing key defense in 2024, likely making Nevada among the GOP’s major campaign targets in next year’s bid to flip control of the Senate.  

Last October, Rosen told Politico she was “all in” on a 2024 campaign and earlier this month touted the hiring of the former finance director for Ohio Senate candidate Tim Ryan, who set fundraising records in his failed bid against Republican J.D. Vance in 2022. 

Across most Nevada campaigns last year, Democrats vastly outraised their Republican opponents, especially in high-profile races. In the contest between Cortez Masto and Republican Adam Laxalt, for instance, Cortez Masto outraised Laxalt by more than $48 million, according to filings with the FEC. 

That money allowed Democrats and aligned outside groups to blanket the airwaves in attack ads. They often ran TV campaigns months in advance of their GOP rivals, in some cases forcing Republican candidates to spend significantly more money for the same ad slots. 

Still, Republicans often closed the gap late in the election cycle with outside spending, especially from aligned political action committees and national Republican Party campaign operations. 

At the ballot box, the fundraising disparities did not translate to landslide wins for Democrats. Cortez Masto defeated Laxalt by less than 0.8 percentage points, and former Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak lost to Republican Joe Lombardo by 1.5 percentage points despite also out-fundraising the former Clark County sheriff. 

Rosen — a former computer programmer and synagogue president — was first elected to Congress in 2016, besting Republican Danny Tarkanian as a newcomer to politics in the Las Vegas-area District 3. One cycle later, she challenged Republican Sen. Dean Heller in 2018, beating the beleaguered incumbent in a blue-wave year charged by the failed push by congressional Republicans to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act under President Donald Trump. 

With no Republican challengers announced, and nearly two full years to go before the November 2024 election, early estimates have predicted an electoral edge for the incumbent Rosen. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report, which rates the competitiveness of federal races, rates Rosen’s contest as one of five “Lean-Democratic” races.