The stage of the first U.S. 2020 presidential election Democratic candidates debate is seen before the first 10 of 20 total Democrats take to the stage at the Adrienne Arsht Performing Arts Center in Miami, June 26, 2019.

In a longtime Republican district covering a wealthy enclave of Dallas, Democratic challenger Shawn Terry has raised $235,000, an eye-popping amount for a statehouse race that's more than a year away. In Virginia, where the GOP holds a slim majority, Democrats have outraised Republicans for the first time in years. Democrats are even putting some money in deeply Republican Louisiana.
The cash deluge shows how the consequences of next year's elections run far deeper than President Donald Trump's political fate. The party that controls state legislatures will take a leading role in the once-in-a-decade redistricting process that redraws congressional maps. Newly empowered Republicans used that process to their favor following the tea party victories, and Democrats want to use the same playbook.

The stakes are particularly high following a recent Supreme Court ruling that decided federal courts have no business policing political boundary disputes in many cases. The ruling doesn't apply to districts gerrymandered along racial lines but otherwise gives states wide latitude to draw maps with little concern for an eventual judicial rebuke.
“Everybody knows everything is at stake,” said Stephanie Schriock, president of the group EMILY's List, which recruits and trains women to run for office and plans to spend $20 million on legislative races. “We just have to go in and win chambers.”

And Democratic donors who gave little to nothing to down-ballot races in the past are cutting large checks to groups focused on state races, the AP's analysis shows. Among them are billionaire George Soros (at least $5.4 million), hedge fund billionaire Donald Sussman (at least $4.8 million) and billionaire investor and entrepreneur Fred Eychaner (at least $4.2 million).

The numbers don't take into account the activities of nonprofit “dark money” groups that both Republicans and Democrats operate. They won't have to disclose their finances until next year at the earliest.
But already the money is filtering out to the states.
Priorities USA, the largest Democratic outside group, and EMILY's List recently announced they would spend $600,000 on voter mobilization for Virginia's fall elections. For the first time, the Democratic opposition research group American Bridge is digging into the pasts of Republican statehouse candidates.
It all stems from what Democrats describe as a nearly traumatizing experience in 2010 when, reveling in the early days of the Obama administration, they failed to organize at the state level. Democratic strategist Jessica Post remembers being outside a bar in Pennsylvania's capital city of Harrisburg when she got word of just how thoroughly her party was rejected.
“After curling up on the sidewalk, I walked back into the bar, popped open a Budweiser and said to myself, `If I have anything to do with this, we will not get outclassed in 2020 by the Republicans,” said Post, who now leads the DLCC and is tasked with reclaiming lost ground.

“People finally understand that you just can't play every four years in the presidential, you have to play in these state races,” said McAuliffe, a top Democratic fundraiser. “You could have a great wave in Congress, but if you have all these gerrymandered districts, I don't care how much money you have.”
Next year's elections will still play out under the maps that Republicans drew after the 2010 campaign. But Democrats are hoping that the money they're investing in state races, higher turnout in a presidential election year and frustration with Trump, particularly in the suburbs, could give them the lift they need.

“It is serious as a heart attack, and we've got to do everything we can to prepare for it,” he said.