Fonfara to report over $300,000 in first quarter. Outpaces Arulampalam by about $100,000 in bruising campaign fundraising battle.

State Senator John Fonfara will today report raising more than $300,000 in his first campaign finance report of the race for the Democratic nomination for mayor of Hartford, Daily Ructions can report. That hefty number will put Fonfara about $100,000 ahead of Arunan Arulampalam, another contestant for the nomination that decides the election.

Fonfara has benefited from tapping into the network of lobbyists that need his help in passing or thwarting legislation during the legislative session that continues until early June. Lobbyist money is easy for the co-chair of the legislature’s finance committee to raise. Fanfara has been able to reach beyond the low-hanging lobbyist fruit (at $1,000 each) and a significant pile of the green stuff that folds.

Arulumpalam reports raising $225,000 in his first bid for public office in Hartford. He is well-connected in the business community and the state’s shrinking universe of Republican donors thought his father-in-law, Greg Butler, a top executive of Eversource, the state’s primary utility. Butler has been working the phones for Arulumpalam. Eversource has many tentacles. Butler is married to Themis Klarides, the former House Minority Leader who suffered a stinging loss to Greenwich Republican Leora Levy in last summer’s U.S. Senate primary.

Retired judge and former state Senator Eric Coleman is also seeking the Democratic nomination for mayor. Arulampalam, Coleman and Fonfara are the three candidates who are expected to advance to a primary after the Hartford Democratic Town Committee endorses a candidate in July.

Published April 10, 2023.