Just one day after President Joe Biden announced he would not be running for re-election, the Democratic Party raised an impressive $100 million from donors through its primary fundraising platform.
ActBlue, a political action committee dedicated to fundraising for Democratic candidates, reported this amount over two days, utilizing a real-time tracker developed by Ryan Murphy from The Marshall Project. While these figures are not yet official—being based on ActBlue’s extensive tracking of donations since its inception in 2004—they offer an early glimpse at the group’s financial success before formal disclosures are submitted.
On Sunday alone, donations amounted to $66.9 million for the launch of Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the highest single-day fundraising total for the 2024 election cycle for ActBlue. The previous record was on September 30, 2020, when Biden and Trump engaged in their first presidential debate, according to Murphy.
The donations on Sunday allowed ActBlue to surpass $14 billion in funds raised since its founding two decades ago. In comparison, WinRed, the Republican fundraising platform that was launched in late 2019, has accumulated approximately $4.3 billion in donations, according to OpenSecrets.
ActBlue remarked on social media that many individuals reported making their first donation within the last 24 hours, highlighting a growing grassroots movement of new small-dollar donors.
Additionally, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from major donors within 24 hours of Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris, as reported by Politico. The organization Swing Left, which was established to support the eventual Democratic nominee, announced that it raised over $160,000 in just 24 hours.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, expressed on Monday that Harris’s campaign will be “very well financed” and affirmed his support for her. Notable Democratic donors George and Alex Soros have also shown their backing for Harris.
Historically, Biden’s strongest fundraising days have followed significant events, such as after he faced a defeat against Donald Trump during a televised debate on June 27, leading to approximately $28 million raised. Following Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden garnered $19.2 million, while Trump and his associated groups raised $69 million in the following days, resulting in a temporary crash of Trump’s campaign website. In that month, the aligned super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., raised $70 million.
From April to June, pro-Biden groups secured $332.4 million, whereas pro-Trump groups raised $431.2 million, according to The Financial Times. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million available, compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.