Big money is flowing into San Antonio’s mayoral race for two candidates with ties to major Republican and Democratic party leaders — leaving other candidates to pour personal money into their campaigns to stay relevant.

San Antonio has a relatively low, $1,000 individual contribution limit for mayoral campaigns, which creates a challenge for local candidates who are raising money from the same pool of local donors.

But the 27 candidates vying to be San Antonio’s next mayor are allowed to contribute unlimited amounts of their own money to their campaigns, and political action committees are not beholden to the contribution limit at all.

The clearest sign yet of how those rules will impact the mayoral race came with Thursday’s campaign finance reports, covering money raised and spent in some of the final months leading up to the May 3 race.

Former Air Force Under Secretary Gina Ortiz Jones, who has been endorsed by national Democratic groups, reported raising $167,000 in contributions in the past three months — more than any other candidate in the race.

The reports cover between Jan. 1 and March 24. One final round of fundraising reports before the election will be made public April 25, covering money raised and spent between March 25 and April 23.

Among the surprising details this latest round of reports revealed: Councilman Manny Pelaez (D8), an attorney from the Northwest side, loaned his campaign a whopping $324,000.

Pelaez is a left-leaning candidate trying to keep up with Ortiz Jones, whose deep-pocketed allies from past congressional races have pitched in big for her mayoral campaign this year.

Ortiz Jones joined the race in December, later than most other candidates, and spent nearly $240,000 between Jan. 1 and March 24. Pelaez, who has been in the race since last April, spent just $60,000.

But while Ortiz Jones reported about $50,000 left to spend in the final stretch, Pelaez reported close to $300,000.

On the conservative side, Texas GOP leaders are spending big to boost a lesser-known conservative candidate with powerful political connections in former Texas Secretary of State Rolando Pablos.

Pablos reported raising about $165,000 and spending $235,000 in the past three months — nearly identical to Ortiz Jones.

But in a new wrinkle to the race, former Councilman Clayton Perry, who represented Northside’s District 10, put $100,000 of his own money into his campaign, according to his most recent report.

Perry maintained a loyal following of Northside supporters throughout his three terms on the council, but had almost no campaign war chest left at the end of the previous campaign finance reporting period.

Now thanks to his infusion of personal cash, Perry is running mail ads and has billboards up across the Northside, his campaign said. He’s also been paying for digital ads attacking Pablos for his past support of Mayor Ron Nirenberg.

Pablos is supposed to be getting help from a PAC aligned with Gov. Greg Abbott that set a goal of raising $2 million for the race. A report filed with the state showed the group had raised about $130,000 so far, and as of March 24, had not started spending.

Missing from Thursday’s reports was tech entrepreneur Beto Altamirano, who has also been putting lots of personal money into his campaign.

Altamirano’s campaign said when his report lands, it will show he put another roughly $50,000 of his own money into the race, for a total haul of about $180,000 raised in the last three months. Altamirano plans to report about $215,000 on hand for the final stretch.

All candidates are vying for a spot in the June 7 runoff, when the top two finishers from the May 3 election will face off, meaning candidates are incentivized to put everything they can into making that cutoff.

With just weeks to go before the start of early voting, money is one of the few ways candidates can get their messages out to differentiate themselves in the unusually crowded race.

But other candidates are working with nowhere near the kind of money that Ortiz Jones, Pablos, Pelaez and Altamirano have.

Southside Councilwoman Adriana Rocha Garcia (D4) brought in about $45,000, spent $26,000 and had about $54,000 on hand, according to her report.

Westside Councilwoman Melissa Cabello Havrda (D6) reported raising about $37,000, spent about $30,000 and had roughly $36,000 on hand.

Northside Councilman John Courage (D9), who dropped out of the race and got back in, raised just $6,000.

One outlier was real estate developer Robert Melvin. He reported in his haul an unusual $115,000 of donated campaign help, including political consulting and digital marketing.