Election 2026: Follow the Money

ELECTION 2026 · EDITION 3

Follow the Money

Welcome back to CommonWealth Beacon‘s Election 2026 newsletter run.

It’s not just the cost of living that’s made the 2026 elections in Massachusetts a matter of money.

Political spending has become one of the primary avenues of attack Gov. Maura Healey is taking against her opponent, Mike Minogue. The Republican earned a fortune leading and then selling medical device company Abiomed; in recent years, he’s donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Republican National Committee and to a pro-Trump super PAC.

That alone would give ammunition to any Democrat. And Minogue has also put his wealth toward his own campaign, donating more than $17 million as of early October and significantly outspending Healey, who herself has raised about $7.6 million since the start of 2025.

Cue the governor’s attack ad.

Plus, there are a record-tying nine ballot questions set to go before voters, which have already generated millions of dollars in spending and have a solid chance at tying the single-cycle record of $65.8 million set in 2022, when four questions were on the ballot, including a landmark surtax on wealthy households, which passed with 52 percent of the vote.

Unlike individual candidates for office, who cannot receive more than $1,000 in donations from a single source in a year, there are no limits on what Bay Staters, businesses, and political action committees can contribute to ballot question campaigns.

That’s allowed a small fortune to change hands already. Smart Approaches to Marijuana, a national nonprofit that opposes legal drug use, is the single biggest question backer this cycle so far with $3.5 million contributed to the effort to repeal recreational marijuana. The coalition of business groups known as the Massachusetts Opportunity Alliance has offered $1.9 million, all in-kind contributions, to the effort to tweak a state tax cap. And several private-equity hotshots have put big money behind a proposal to change state primary elections, with Randy Peeler — a founding donor to CommonWealth Beacon – kicking in more than $1 million.

It’s a robust business across state elections, but for the 160-member House and 40-member Senate, less of the money goes directly into campaigning than you might think.

Consider the tale of two senators. Will Brownsberger had one of the toughest primary elections of all his colleagues, a closely watched race against Boston Mayor Michelle Wu-backed challenger Daniel Lander that he barely survived following a recount. Senate President Karen Spilka was once again unopposed — in fact, she hasn’t faced a challenger for her Senate seat since 2010.

Since the start of the year, Brownsberger spent nearly $575,000 on the effort to keep his seat, nearly twice as much as Spilka spent in that span.

But if you count from the start of the two-year term, the order is flipped. From January 1, 2025, through the end of August 2026, Brownsberger spent about $838,000, and Spilka spent $938,000 on a whole host of things from political consulting to travel to a conference to a $2,150 “ice cream reception for Senate staff during budget week.”

That’s the way money has long worked in the Legislature: lawmakers burn piles of campaign cash even when they don’t need to exert an ounce of effort to secure reelection. In 2024, a study by state campaign finance regulators found, candidates running for the House unopposed spent about $1,700 more on average than candidates running for the House with opponents — a figure probably skewed by routine big spending among the chamber’s most powerful Democrats.

But if someone doesn’t have an opponent, you might ask, what are they even buying with all that money?

The answer: A little bit of everything. There’s the maintenance of websites and offices. Consultants and strategists remain on the payroll even in times of smooth sailing. Lawmakers send condolence flowers to friends and constituents and charge it to their campaign accounts.

Then there are the other expenses. House Speaker Ron Mariano dropped $379.48 on “refreshments for the office” in January 2026. In late August, Sen. Julian Cyr picked up a $417.73 tab at Mac’s Fish House in Provincetown for what he described as a “mtg w/ colleague and supporters.”

All of that is allowed, technically, because state campaign finance laws governing legislators allow the use of campaign dollars on anything that supports a candidate’s “political future.”

As election mania hits its peak, don’t expect the avalanche to slow. Minogue set a record in September for the most a gubernatorial candidate spent in a single month, with $6.1 million. Healey, meanwhile, splashed out $4.1 million of her own, the most she personally has spent in a single month of campaigning dating back to her inaugural attorney general campaign in 2014.

No one ever said politics is cheap.

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