One was a heavy spender. Two put six-figure amounts of their own money into their political campaigns. Two had gangbuster financial starts. One received multiple checks from family members.
After a preseason devoted largely to raising money, Barbara Sharief, Rodney Jacobs Jr. and Chad Klitzman — competitors in what will be a fiercely fought contest for an open state Senate seat in Broward County — began the election year in various stages of financial readiness with much, much more campaign fundraising and spending yet to come.
The total so far, for an August primary, more than $500,000.
The contest
Sharief, Jacobs and Klitzman are Democrats running for their party’s nomination in Senate District 35, in the southwest quarter of Broward County, mostly south of Interstate 595 and west of Florida’s Turnpike.
The district also includes territory around the hockey arena formerly known as the BB&T Center (currently branded as the Amerant Bank Arena), and the Sawgrass Mills shopping mall, along with vast unpopulated territory in the Everglades. It takes in all or parts of Cooper City, Davie, Hollywood, Miramar, Pembroke Pines, Sunrise and Southwest Ranches and Weston.
State Sen. Lauren Book, the Senate Democratic leader, currently represents District 35; term limits prevent Book from running again.
The district is heavily Democratic, so the winner of the August primary is the likely winner of the November election. Voter registration figures show 42.1% of the district’s voters are Democrats, 24.2% are Republicans, 31.8% are no party affiliation/independents and 1.9% are in minor parties.
Klitzman
Klitzman raised more money, and spent less than the other two candidates, leaving him with the largest bank balance on Jan. 1.
From the time he entered the race in October through the end of 2023, Klitzman raised $105,373, lent $100,000 to his campaign, and spent $13,974 when totaling his campaign and his Future of Broward political committee.
That left him with $191,399 on hand at the beginning of the election year. (He said earlier this month he’d raised $50,000 in the first part of January.)
“Things are going incredibly well. I’ve been able to raise more money than both of my opponents combined, excluding candidate loans,” Klitzman said. “I think that speaks to the breadth of support I have not only in the community, but across the state and the country.”
He didn’t enter the race until Oct. 26, though he’d been contemplating the run since summer 2022, when it was certain the seat would be open this year.
From his first day through Dec. 31, he raised an average of $1,145 a day.
His fundraising total includes $19,300 from relatives or entities connected with relatives.
“When you jump into a race, the first folks you reach out to are friends and family,” he said. “Aside from the people whose last name might be Klitzman, we had more grassroots donors in Broward County than I think any of the others have had in a single report.”
Jacobs
Jacobs had a strong burst of fundraising as he entered the race.
From the time he declared his candidacy in August through Dec. 31, Jacobs raised $62,777 and spent $26,761 in the combined accounts of his campaign committee and his A New Hope For Tomorrow PAC.
That left him with a balance of $36,016 at the beginning of the election year.
Unlike Klitzman and Sharief, Jacobs didn’t lend money to his campaign. (Typically, candidate loans to the campaign aren’t repaid and effectively become contributions.)
“Sadly the Jacobs family hasn’t been that fortunate in life where I can” make sizable contributions to his campaign. “You’re not going to see any big checks from me.”
His best fundraising period was immediately after he announced his candidacy on Aug. 25. He raised an average of $1,320 a day through Sept. 30.
“We’re off to some good footing. We’ve had a lot of grassroots support,” Jacobs said. “It’s still super early. We’re happy about where the campaign is.”
All the candidates received money from a range of sources. A perusal of Jacobs’ donations show two contrasting contributions.
He received $250 from Delrish Moss, who spent 30 years in the Miami Police Department, became the first Black police chief in Ferguson, Mo., after the civil unrest that stemmed from the 2014 killing of Michale Brown, and is now police chief in Miramar.
He’s also received $1,000 from Adrian Lukis, a lobbyist in Tallahassee — and a former chief of staff for Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.
“I’m grateful for all my donations,” Jacobs said when asked about the Lukis donation. He said he didn’t know what led to it, but said support from such diverse donors shows “I’m not carrying anybody’s water.”
Sharief
Sharief has been running for the seat the longest, and has spent far more than the other candidates.
She raised $52,867, lent $131,680 to her campaign, and spent $164,836 from the time she entered the race in September 2022 through the end of 2023. The totals reflect her campaign committee and her Believe in Florida PAC.
Sharief started 2024 with a balance of $19,711 at the beginning of the election year.
In the final quarter of 2023, she raised $6,235, loaned her campaign $51,000 and spent $46,610.
Her best fundraising quarter was from April 1 through June 30 of last year. That included May, when she held a fundraising event at the Riverside Hotel to kick off her campaign — and show she had support from a range of Democratic elected officials, party activists and other political insiders. (Several of her $1,000 contributions have come from prominent lobbyists.
In the first 10 months of the campaign — more than a year before the Aug. 20 Democratic primary — Sharief spent more than $50,000 on payments (ranging from $22 to $5,500) for consulting.
Ryann Greenberg, Sharief’s campaign manager, said via text Sharief “has not stopped campaigning since she filed for this seat more than a year ago,” declining to elaborate on the consulting spending.
“Our campaign’s priority is to stay focused on getting the vote out, including re-enrolling voters for vote by mail. Yes, we have consultants who are working hard to continue the positive momentum of our campaign and we are not divulging our strategy,” she said.
Sharief has spent a lot of her own money on recent campaigns ($803,500 on 2021 special congressional primary and $630,000 on a 2022 campaign for state Senate) and has the ability to do so again. A financial disclosure she filed in connection with a 2022 election showed she had a net worth of $6.4 million as of Dec. 31, 2021.
She also spends some of her personal resources on other activities that can benefit her as a candidate.
Last year, she paid for TV ads telling people that they needed to sign up if they wanted to receive vote-by-mail ballots for 2024 elections. She appeared with various political leaders and entertainment personalities in the spots, which were shown on network television affiliates in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale TV market, in English and Spanish, and on cable and satellite channels.
In an October press release, Sharief’s campaign said “she is personally committing almost $100,000 for the month-long ad buy.” Her campaign finance reports show only one advertising expenditure for the fourth quarter, for less than $1,000.
On Saturday, she hosts the annual “Sharief Family Fun Day” at C.B. Smith Park, located in the heart of the state Senate district in Pembroke Pines. It’s promoted as “free to the public,” with “free food & refreshments,” “bounce houses,” “free raffles w/ great prizes,” and other assorted attractions and activities.
The candidates
Klitzman, a lawyer, came close to winning a countywide Democratic primary for Broward Supervisor of Elections in 2020, performing far better than several political veterans who also ran. In the territory that makes up Senate District 35, Klitzman did better than his countywide performance, finishing first.
Earlier this month, he announced endorsements from state Sen. Tina Polksy, state Rep. Michael Gottlieb, and Broward school Board member Lori Alhadeff, who serves as board chair, and eight former elected officials.
Jacobs, executive director of the Miami Civilian Investigative Panel, a government agency that investigates complaints about alleged police misconduct in the city’s police department, has never run for elected office before.
His most recent endorsement, from the veterans organization VoteVets, was last year.
Sharief, a former Broward County Commissioner twice chosen by her colleagues to serve yearlong terms as county mayor, is also a also a former Miramar city commissioner
Sharief, a registered nurse, has a doctorate in nursing practice and is founder of a home health agency, South Florida Pediatric Homecare.
Her 2022 challenge to Book, the Democratic Party leader in the state Senate, angered many in the party.
It forced Book to spend money and time on her own reelection contest in Broward County, rather than travel the state campaigning and raising money for other Democrats. Book supporters thought Sharief should have waited until 2024, because the seat would come open because of term limits. Sharief rejected that view, arguing Book didn’t have an automatic right to the seat.
The most recent endorsement for Sharief, announced earlier this month, came from the Florida AFL-CIO. Greenberg said Sharief has more than 80 endorsements from current and former elected officials and party activists.
Parlatore
Republican Vincent Parlatore has filed paperwork to run for the seat.
Parlatore also announced a candidacy in 2022, but in a late move, he switched to run for state representative, a contest he lost. His paperwork to change races arrived just 33 minutes before the deadline for candidates to get on the ballot, too late for another candidate to come forward for the Senate race.
That move left Republicans without a candidate — and made the primary for the 35th District open to all voters, who reelected Book.
On Sept. 25, he filed paperwork as a candidate for the Senate seat. Through Dec. 31, he’d taken in $525 and spent $39.
Anthony Man can be reached at and can be found @browardpolitics on Bluesky, Threads, Facebook and Post.news.
