Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not pursue re-election, the Democratic Party raised $100 million from donors via its primary fundraising platform.
ActBlue, a political action committee and fundraising platform oriented towards Democratic entities, documented this significant fundraising event over the past two days, utilizing a live tracker managed by Ryan Murphy from The Marshall Project. While the figures are not officially verified and stem from ActBlue’s long-running tracker since 2004, they offer insights into the group’s fundraising activities ahead of the forthcoming deadline for disclosure.
On Sunday alone, contributions totaled $66.9 million for the launch of Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the highest fundraising day of the 2024 election cycle for ActBlue. The second highest had been recorded on September 30, 2020, during the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
This surge of donations on Sunday also enabled ActBlue to achieve a total of $14 billion raised since its inception two decades ago. Its Republican counterpart, WinRed, which began operations in late 2019, has managed to raise approximately $4.3 billion, as reported by OpenSecrets.
ActBlue stated on X, formerly Twitter, that they had witnessed numerous first-time donors making contributions in the past 24 hours, expressing motivation in the influx of small-dollar donations joining the grassroots movement.
Additionally, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from prominent donors within a day following Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris. Swing Left, which initiated a fund to back the Democratic nominee, reported raising over $160,000 within the same time frame.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, affirmed on Monday that Harris’s campaign would be “very well financed” and expressed his support for her efforts. Moreover, prominent Democratic donors George and Alex Soros have also pledged support to Harris.
Previously, Biden experienced his best fundraising days following his significant defeat by Trump during a televised debate on June 27, raising about $28 million between that date and June 28, based on an analysis from the New York Times.
In the wake of Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden raised $19.2 million, while Trump and his affiliated groups collected $69 million from May 30 to May 31, causing a temporary crash of Trump’s campaign website. An allied super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., raised $70 million in the same month.
From April to June, pro-Biden entities raised $332.4 million, while pro-Trump groups garnered $431.2 million, as reported by The Financial Times. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million in funds compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.