Voters and businesses have opened their wallets for Darren White in the five-week sprint to the city’s runoff Election Day, a new analysis by City Desk found.
In the first 72 hours following the Nov. 4 regular election, White raised $102,000 to kickoff a the head-to-head runoff with incumbent Mayor Tim Keller. It’s only gotten better for White from there. Campaign finance reports analyzed by City Desk show that White raised $258,000 between Nov. 4 and Nov. 28. By comparison, White’s campaign raised $303,000 over the entire seven month regular election period, though the field of candidates was much larger.
Who is funding Darren White?
White’s campaign posted 676 individual donations through Nov. 28, the most recent city reporting date.
While 75% of those donations are $200 or less, a number of large contributions helped to quickly fill the campaign’s coffers.
Dorothy Rainosek of The Frontier and Golden Pride restaurants gave White’s campaign $5,000, as did local real estate development companies associated with local developer Jimmy Daskalos.
White’s biggest donations of $6,000 each came from Kane Ouesis, owner of Oasis Cannabis, property developer Doug Peterson (who also provided $6,000 from one of his corporate accounts), Lee Blaugrund, a developer associated with American Home Furniture, Pitre Buick GMC auto dealers, Art and Toya Kaplan, founders of Weck’s restaurants, and Allen Weh of CSI Aviation, a private aviation firm with large ICE deportation contracts. White has promised to allow federal immigration agents greater access to persons arrested for crimes, if elected. The New Mexico Association of Realtors PAC also gave $6,000.
A number of other large donors rounded out White’s first month campaign reports. Bill and Carol Windham, Republican donors from Louisiana, were the largest out-of-state donors. Each donated $5,000.
Keller qualified for public financing which provided him with $377,000 for the runoff. Both candidates also have outside groups supporting their efforts.
Editor’s note: Darren White was an original co-founder and donor helping to launch City Desk in 2024, but he has never participated in editorial decisions.
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