Just one day after President Joe Biden announced he would not pursue re-election, Democrats managed to raise $100 million from donors through their primary fundraising platform.
ActBlue, a political action committee and fundraising platform for Democratic organizations, recorded this amount over a two-day period, as noted by Ryan Murphy, a developer at The Marshall Project, who maintains a live tracker. While this figure is not officially validated—it stems from ActBlue’s own comprehensive donation tracker since its inception in 2004—it offers insight into the group’s fundraising performance ahead of any mandatory disclosures.
On Sunday alone, donors contributed $66.9 million to launch Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, which marked the highest single-day fundraising total for the 2024 cycle via ActBlue. The previous high occurred on September 30, 2020, during the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump, according to Murphy’s data.
This surge in donations allowed ActBlue to surpass a substantial milestone, reaching $14 billion raised since its establishment two decades ago. In contrast, WinRed, the Republican equivalent which started in late 2019, has collected approximately $4.3 billion, according to OpenSecrets.
ActBlue expressed enthusiasm over the influx of contributions, noting that many individuals reported making their first donations within the past 24 hours. “It’s so motivating to see new small-dollar donors join the grassroots movement!” the organization stated on social media.
Additionally, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from major donors within 24 hours of Biden endorsing Harris. Swing Left, an initiative supporting the eventual Democratic nominee, stated it raised over $160,000 within that same timeframe.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, expressed support for Harris’s campaign on Monday, highlighting that it will be “very well financed.” Major Democratic donors, including George and Alex Soros, have also pledged their backing to Harris.
In terms of previous fundraising efforts, Biden experienced significant financial support right after a televised debate on June 27, where he faced Donald Trump. Biden and his affiliated committees raised approximately $28 million from that day into the following day. Furthermore, after Trump was convicted on 34 felony charges, Biden raised $19.2 million, while Trump and his associated groups garnered $69 million during a similar period, briefly crashing Trump’s campaign website due to the spike in donations. An aligned super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., raised $70 million that same month.
From April to June, pro-Biden groups collected $332.4 million, while those in favor of Trump raised $431.2 million, as reported by The Financial Times. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million available, compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.