Cowboys Owner Jones Donates $500,000 to Abbott’s Campaign

(Bloomberg) -- Billionaire Jerry Jones, the owner of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys, is one of three business executives who each donated $500,000 to Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s campaign in the final weeks before the Nov. 8 election.

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The contribution from Jones is the largest he has ever made in a Texas statewide election, according to filings from the Texas Ethics Commission dating back to 2000. The governor also received half-a-million-dollar donations from billionaire Ken Fisher of Fisher Investments and oil mogul Syed Javaid Anwar, the founder of Midland Energy Inc.

Messages left for Jones, Fisher and Anwar weren’t immediately returned.

The latest campaign donations were revealed just one week before the gubernatorial election that Abbott is favored to win over Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke, a former US congressman from El Paso. The governor raised $8.8 million in the latest fundraising round from Sept. 30 to Oct. 29 and had $3.7 million on hand, according to Texas Ethics Commission filings published Tuesday.

O’Rourke raised $10.5 million during the most recent period and his campaign had $4.25 million on hand as of Oct. 29, according to election filings. Notable contributors to O’Rourke include James Y Chao, the co-founder of Houston-based Westlake Corp., a $12 billion company that manufactures industrial and consumer products. Chao donated $50,000 to O’Rourke’s campaign at the end of October.

Both Abbott and O’Rourke have benefactors in the Perot family. Abbott received $250,000 from Henry Ross Perot Jr., the founder of Hillwood Development Co., a real estate firm in Dallas. O’Rourke received $50,000 from Katherine Perot Reeves, the daughter of the late Henry Ross Perot Sr. and sibling of Perot Jr.

Recent polls show Abbott leading O’Rourke by anywhere from five to 11 percentage points. Although the underdog, O’Rourke has proved a challenge to Abbott when it comes to fundraising.

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