Who will donate to GT Thompson, Bilger in 2026 race? What we know about their coffers
The U.S. House in race in Centre County features two champion high school athletes, but one of them finds himself in an unfavorable position for a sportsman: underdog.
Ray Bilger, a Bellefonte-area U.S. Air Force veteran and former intelligence officer, is set to kick off a Democratic bid to oust incumbent Rep. Glenn Thompson Thursday, Feb. 12. But Thompson has already pulled in $1.2 million for the 2026 race, a sum that could triple if he keeps up with recent fundraising trends.
The nine-term Republican congressman from Howard, who outraised his last Democratic opponent 20-to-1 on the way to a 43-point victory in 2024, enters this year’s race with $867,000 cash on hand, according to his most recent campaign finance report. He filed to run for reelection weeks after his 2024 landslide, and a spokesman said Wednesday he “plans to make a more formal campaign announcement” in the coming days.
“Mr. Thompson is looking forward to the opportunity to continue sharing with the voters why he is the best candidate for the job,” said the spokesman, Matt Brennan.
Bilger said in an interview Tuesday he hopes to raise $100,000 by March and $1 million by November, goals that dwarf what any recent Democratic campaign has been able to pull in.
Thompson’s campaign coffers are largely lined by individuals and groups associated with agriculture. He is the chairman of the House Agriculture Committee. Other notable donors include Norman Reed and Brian Armstrong, the CEOs of top cryptocurrency firms. Reed pitched $3,500 to the Thompson campaign last year, and Armstrong, ranked among the 500 richest people in the world by Forbes, gave $6,600.
AccuWeather president Joel Myers is another top donor, having contributed $4,000.
Bilger said while he is personally opposed to corporate political spending and would work to stop it once in office, he would “have to take some in order to try to level the playing field.”
“So many rules have been broken throughout the past year,” he said.
Brennan said that the congressman “believes elections are earned through hard work and the best ideas, not the deepest pocket.”
Thompson is used to big wins and big money
The race for Pennsylvania’s 15th congressional district, among the most rural and conservative in the commonwealth, is rated “Solid R” by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. It was ignored by national Democrats in the last election.
Republicans outnumber Democrats 2-to-1 in the district. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the group funding competitive Democratic House candidates, does not list the 15th as “in play.”
Thompson has only once faced a Democratic opponent who raised more than $150,000. That candidate, Brookville lawyer Kerith Strano Taylor, twice lost to Thompson in the 2010s with only a third of the vote.
In 2024, Thompson brought in $2.8 million, making him one of the top GOP fundraisers in the commonwealth in that election cycle. The campaign donated almost a third of its money — about $875,000 — to other Republican candidates and groups.
Thompson’s Democratic opponent that year, Zach Womer, raised $140,000 total.
The Bilger fundraising strategy
Bilger, a first-time candidate, said he is hoping to lean on a network that includes rural Democrats, fellow veterans and D.C. connections made over his years in government. He said he hoped a majority of campaign money comes from small-dollar donors.
“We are doing things the way that you would normally do things in a tactical intelligence operation,” Bilger said.
The former Republican said he spent the weekend at the Pennsylvania Democratic Party’s state committee meeting in Harrisburg. There, he said, Philadelphia-area Rep. Madeleine Dean and Danny Ceisler, who won the Bucks County sheriff’s race last year in an upset, expressed interest in his campaign.
Bilger said he hasn’t heard anything specifically about support from national Democrats, though he hopes to tap into national funds sent to the state for campaign purposes. He added that some D.C.-area labor leaders “are interested in providing some donations.”
