Low fuel pressure with new fuel pump

hey guys, I’m banging my head against a wall on this one and need some advice and guidance.. The car is a 72 demon with a 360. I just installed a new Holley red pump (to replace the current Edelbrock small pump mounted improperly and not flowing well enough) behind the fuel tank, at the same level as the bottom of the tank. I’ve got an inline filter before the pump facing the right direction. All brand new 3/8” hoses and lines to and from the fuel pump are going the right way. I have the line running to another fuel filter in the engine compartment, then to a regulator, then to a fuel pressure gauge, then to the carb (Edelbrock 1405). Once started it only has 2 lbs of pressure. The pre filter before the fuel pump gets sucked almost completely dry. Positioning that filter only helps slightly with increasing the levels of fuel in it. The filter in the engine bay fills to about 1/4 full but after revving the engine some it’s almost empty. The gauge then reads 0, but the car continues to idle.

I went ahead and bypassed the regulator to see what I was getting from the pump. It holds at a steady 3 lbs of pressure, but the pre filter again runs low (doesn’t ever fill completely up) and the engine bay filter runs about at the same levels.

What gives?????? I made these changes to a bigger pump to give me significantly more fuel pressure! Not less

Any guidance would help greatly