{"id":111752,"date":"2026-01-09T12:34:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T12:34:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/111752\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T12:34:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T12:34:21","slug":"bob-buckhorn-political-committee-raises-400k-plus-in-q4-bringing-total-to-1-4m-for-eventual-tampa-mayoral-comeback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/111752\/","title":{"rendered":"Bob Buckhorn political committee raises $400K-plus in Q4, bringing total to $1.4M for eventual Tampa mayoral comeback"},"content":{"rendered":"

The political committee supporting former Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn in his eventual bid to return to his old job leading the city raised $414,750 in the fourth quarter of 2025, bringing the overall fundraising for Friends of Bob Buckhorn<\/a> to $1.4 million, according to a press release from his committee.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can feel the excitement in this community as we prepare for Tampa\u2019s next chapter,\u201d Buckhorn said. \u201cThat enthusiasm is reflected in these numbers. These are friends, neighbors, and people I\u2019ve worked alongside for years who believe in this city and its future. That kind of trust means everything to me, and I\u2019m grateful for every person who\u2019s helped build this momentum.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buckhorn has not officially launched a mayoral campaign for the race next year to replace incumbent Mayor Jane Castor, who is facing term limits. But he has widely indicated he plans to run.<\/p>\n

The committee disclosed overall fundraising in the fourth quarter to Florida Politics and details are not yet publicly available. Reports are due to the Division of Elections by Jan. 12. The press release did not detail donors or expenditures.<\/p>\n

As of Sept. 30, the most recent date for which fundraising details are available, Buckhorn had raised $1 million<\/a> and spent just over $10,000.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The early fundraising could serve to dissuade others considering running for Mayor as the race approaches in 2027, though it\u2019s widely expected Buckhorn will face at least one opponent, current City Council member Bill Carlson, who has long been an adversary to the former Mayor.<\/p>\n

Buckhorn, a Democrat, served two terms as Tampa Mayor, from 2011 to 2019, and left office with strong approval ratings. While Tampa limits Mayors to two terms, those limits reset once out of office for two terms, which allows Buckhorn to run again.<\/p>\n

The race is widely expected to serve as a referendum of the left-of-center politics Buckhorn represents against the more progressive leanings of Carlson. In July, a poll unattributed to any potential candidate went out to Tampa voters<\/a> asking about the 2027 contest. Florida Politics did not obtain the results, but a recipient provided screenshots of the questions. One of them curiously left out the option for respondents to indicate an unfavorable opinion of Carlson, while including unfavorable as an option for Buckhorn. Carlson denied knowledge of the poll when asked about it.<\/p>\n

Other potential candidates listed in the poll included former Rep.\u00a0Ed Narain, Hillsborough County Property Appraiser\u00a0Bob\u00a0Henriquez\u00a0and Tampa City Council member\u00a0Lynn Hurtak.<\/p>\n

Two relative political unknowns, Alan Jared Henderson and Julie Magill, are the only candidates filed for Mayor so far.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A poll from Mercury Public Affairs<\/a>\u00a0in May showed Buckhorn far outperforming others in a five-way hypothetical race including Carlson and Hurtak, as well as Sen.\u00a0Jay Collins\u00a0and House Democratic Leader\u00a0Fentrice Driskell. It put Buckhorn 27 points ahead of his closest competitor in the survey, Carlson, at 49% to 22%.<\/p>\n

Driskell has since announced her candidacy<\/a> for Senate, while Collins has since been appointed Lieutenant Governor by Gov. Ron DeSantis\u00a0and there is speculation he may run for Governor this year. The Mercury poll did not include Henriquez or Narain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The political committee supporting former Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn in his eventual bid to return to his old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[52111,47320,56877,56878,5756,28777,135,137,56879,136],"class_list":["post-111752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-bill-carlson","tag-bob-buckhorn","tag-ed-narain","tag-friends-of-bob-buckhorn","tag-jane-castor","tag-lynn-hurtak","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-mayoral-race","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}