Democratic Scranton Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti outraised Republican U.S. Rep. Rob Bresnahan by about $1 million in the year’s second quarter and finished June with about $800,000 more cash on hand than her GOP opponent in the 8th Congressional District race.
The most recent campaign finance reports in that closely watched contest cover a period from April 30 through the end of June and follow preprimary reports filed in May that covered a period from the beginning of April through April 29.
Cognetti’s Paige for PA committee reported total receipts, essentially money raised, of about $2 million in that three-month window compared to the roughly $1.03 million in receipts reported by Bresnahan’s Rob for PA committee, the reports show. She also outraised Bresnahan in the first quarter of 2026, January through March, hauling in about $1.46 million to his almost $1.21 million.
Scranton Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti and U.S. Rob Bresnahan, R-8, Dallas Twp. (TIMES-TRIBUNE FILE)
Bresnahan, a first-term Republican incumbent elected to Congress in 2024, has raised more money overall this election cycle, with Cognetti having only launched her congressional campaign in September. But he’s also spent considerably more than his Democratic challenger, who launched her first television ad of the cycle this week.
The latest report Bresnahan’s campaign filed lists total receipts this cycle of about $5.33 million and total disbursements, essentially money spent, of about $2.81 million. Cognetti had raised about $4.61 million in total this cycle as of the end of last month and spent about $1.2 million, per her most recent filing.
In terms of cash on hand at the end of the last reporting period, Cognetti had almost $3.41 million to Bresnahan’s almost $2.61 million, their filings show.
“Our campaign is rooted in a simple mission: making government work as hard as the people it’s supposed to serve,” Cognetti said in a press release about her second-quarter fundraising. “I’m honored by the support we are earning across NEPA, and I’m proud to be running this race without taking a dime of corporate PAC money. We are going to continue building momentum to win in November and clean up corruption in Washington.”
U.S. Rep. Rob Bresnahan (PA-08) speaks during a press conference on Dalilah’s Law held at the Paul Bickelman FOP Lodge 46 in Spring Brook Twp. Monday, July 13, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Bresnahan’s campaign provided a statement Thursday on his fundraising in recent months.
“While Paige Cognetti’s campaign is fueled by out-of-state donors and the liberal elite, we’re proud of the astounding $1 million raised to help Rep. Bresnahan continue his work on behalf of Northeastern Pennsylvanians in Congress,” the campaign said.
Voters will decide Nov. 3 which of Cognetti or Bresnahan will represent the 8th District in the next Congress and hold the key House seat for the last two years of the second Trump administration. Bresnahan’s reelection would bolster the GOP’s chances of maintaining its House majority, while a Cognetti victory would make more likely the prospect of Democrats regaining majority control of the lower chamber.
Race forecasters and others expect the Bresnahan/Cognetti midterm matchup to be among the most competitive House races in the nation. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report’s House Race Ratings shifted the 8th District race in April from leaning Republican to a “toss up,” which is how it identifies the most competitive races where either party has a good chance of winning.
Campaign themes
Cognetti, who has made fighting corruption a theme of her campaign, announced last week an ambitious eight-point “anti-corruption” policy agenda she said she’d pursue in Congress if elected. Her first television ad of the cycle, “Machine,” embraces the theme and portrays Cognetti as a reformer and enemy of a “corrupt old boys club” who’d work to root out corruption in Washington.
She’s also repeatedly accused Bresnahan of corruption over the stock-trading controversy that’s dogged him despite his insistence that he doesn’t trade his own stocks and had no involvement in the hundreds of trades he disclosed last year.
A recent Cognetti campaign press release about the television ad says Bresnahan “has become the poster-child of Washington corruption by breaking his promise to ban congressional stock trading and instead trading off of his votes in office.”
Bresnahan and the GOP, meanwhile, have attempted to paint Cognetti as a weak-on-crime political opportunist with far-left views more aligned with the progressive politics of the West Coast than voters here.
His campaign recently launched billboards in the style of the famous “got milk?” advertising campaign that say “got gangs?” and bear Cognetti’s name. The billboards also include a web address that links to a recent Breitbart News report on a photo, apparently posted on social media in early 2024, of Cognetti posing with two “operators of a Crips-linked hookah lounge.”
“Northeastern Pennsylvanians deserve to know that Paige Cognetti is cozying up to gang members and providing safe spaces for criminals at the expense of their communities,” Bresnahan campaign spokesperson Samantha Bullock said in a statement included in a recent email about the billboards.
A Cognetti spokesperson told Breitbart that violent crime has gone down under her leadership and that Scranton has invested millions in its Police Department to bolster public safety.
The ultimate effectiveness of the above examples and other messaging by the campaigns between now and November remains to be seen.
Campaign finance information is available online at fec.gov.
The 8th Congressional District includes all of Lackawanna, Wayne and Pike and parts of Luzerne and Monroe counties.