Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not seek re-election, the Democratic Party raised $100 million from donors via its main fundraising platform, ActBlue. This impressive amount was recorded over the past two days according to a live tracker managed by Ryan Murphy from The Marshall Project. While the tracking is not official, it offers insights into the fundraising activities ahead of any required disclosures.
On Sunday alone, donations totaled $66.9 million to support Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, making it the largest single-day fundraising event in the 2024 cycle for ActBlue. For comparison, the second highest amount was recorded on September 30, 2020, coinciding with the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
The surge in donations brought ActBlue’s total raised since its inception to $14 billion. In contrast, its Republican counterpart, WinRed, has amassed approximately $4.3 billion since its launch in late 2019, according to OpenSecrets.
ActBlue remarked on social media that many individuals reported making their first-ever donations within the last 24 hours, highlighting the rise of grassroots support.
Additionally, Future Forward, a super PAC associated with Biden, garnered $150 million in new commitments from major donors shortly after his endorsement of Harris. Another group, Swing Left, announced it raised over $160,000 within a day of Biden’s announcement.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, expressed confidence that Harris’s campaign will be well-funded and pledged support. Major Democratic donors, including George and Alex Soros, have also shown backing for her candidacy.
Previously, Biden experienced significant fundraising boosts following a televised debate loss to Trump on June 27, raising approximately $28 million in the subsequent days. Additionally, he raised $19.2 million following Trump’s conviction on multiple felony counts, with Trump’s campaign raising $69 million in the immediate aftermath, briefly overwhelming their campaign website. Pro-Biden groups raised a total of $332.4 million between April and June, while pro-Trump groups collected $431.2 million during the same period. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million in funds compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.