{"id":5661,"date":"2026-07-14T07:00:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T02:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=5661"},"modified":"2026-07-14T07:00:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T02:00:18","slug":"wisconsin-governor-candidate-says-her-campaign-has-far-less-money-than-she-thought","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=5661","title":{"rendered":"Wisconsin governor candidate says her campaign has far less money than she thought"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"prism-article-body\">\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao MvWXB TjIXL aGjvy ebVHC \"><span class=\"oyrPY qlwaB AGxeB  \">MADISON, Wis. &#8212; <\/span>Wisconsin Democratic <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/wisconsin-trump-democrats-governor-trifecta-10f6a76db6c388da46926c251e1da442\">candidate for governor<\/a> Sara Rodriguez said Monday that she discovered her campaign has hundreds of thousands dollars less cash than she thought after campaign ads slated to run last week did not air because of unpaid invoices.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez, the current lieutenant governor, announced late Sunday night that she had fired her campaign manager just a month before the Aug. 11 primary after discovering contributions had been double counted and expenses were undercounted, leading to her campaign having far less money than she thought.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez, at a news conference surrounded by supporters, vowed to remain in the race while calling the issue a \u201cbump in the road.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">\u201cThis campaign is going to move forward,&#8221; she said in the appearance at her campaign headquarters.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez is in a competitive primary for Wisconsin\u2019s open governor\u2019s race against <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/wisconsin-governor-hong-socialist-democrats-barnes-3387bbcf863f2e9c9781477c3e7a4d46\">democratic socialist<\/a> Francesca Hong; former Lt. Gov. <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/wisconsin-governor-democrat-mandela-barnes-b52af7f188fcaf0afbab4918fa55972e\">Mandela Barnes<\/a>; state Sen. Kelda Roys and Joel Brennan, a former top aide to <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/wisconsin-gov-tony-evers-reelection-78b32ffc51dff53512fd7499f21e9878\">Gov. Tony Evers.<\/a> Evers has not endorsed anyone in the primary.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The winner of the primary will advance to the general election against Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany, who faces only token primary opposition.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Barnes&#8217; campaign manager Darby O\u2019Connor said a mistake like this is \u201cunheard of in professional politics\u201d and said &#8220;a campaign this poorly mismanaged stands no chance against Tom Tiffany this fall.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Hong said in a statement that she was focused on her campaign, but &#8220;it\u2019s vital that everyone running for this position is creating a standard of trust, honesty and accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Brennan called the errors by Rodriguez\u2019s campaign \u201cdisqualifying.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Roys spokesperson Jalen Knuteson said the issue contributed to a pattern showing that &#8220;Rodriguez is unprepared for the rigors of a general election or governing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Last week Rodriguez announced a $1 million television ad campaign buy. But when the ads didn&#8217;t start running as expected, she said she began asking questions and discovered the problems in the campaign reports.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">\u201cI am hurt, angry and deeply disappointed by someone I trusted to run my campaign,\u201d Rodriguez said of her fired campaign manager, Kara Spencer. \u201cI was continually getting inaccurate reports from my campaign manager.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Spencer did not return a message seeking comment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez&#8217;s next report covering money raised and spent over the first six months of the year is due on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez said her campaign immediately notified the Wisconsin Ethics Commission on Monday and was working with them to correct the report filed in January that covers donations and expenditures made last year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The $618,000 she reported raising in 2025 was the second highest of any Democratic candidate, behind only Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley who brought in about $800,000. Crowley dropped out of the race last week and endorsed Rodriguez after she announced a $1 million campaign TV ad buy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Another former Democratic candidate, former state economic development director Missy Hughes, endorsed Rodriguez after she ended her campaign last month.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez said the ads that were supposed to start last week would begin airing next week. She would not say exactly how much her filing was off by because the work to reconcile the books was ongoing. But she said her campaign had raised about $1 million and had about $200,000 cash on hand.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Rodriguez said she was being up front about what happened.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">\u201cIf I were trying to hide something I would be here today telling you about it,&#8221; she said at the news conference. \u201cMost people are not going to stand in front of this many cameras and microphones to talk about fixing an error.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MADISON, Wis. &#8212; Wisconsin Democratic candidate for governor Sara Rodriguez said Monday that she discovered her campaign has hundreds of thousands dollars less cash than she thought after campaign ads slated to run last week did not air because of unpaid invoices. Rodriguez, the current lieutenant governor, announced late Sunday night that she had fired&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5662,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.abcnewsfe.com\/a\/e2c78193-f650-4d9c-b091-8ad0403d4b44\/wirestory_e944dfdf6bd4a63b3e126926dcfd86d6_16x9.jpg?w=1600","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5661\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}