Just one day after President Joe Biden announced that he would not seek re-election, Democrats amassed $100 million from donors through their primary fundraising platform, ActBlue. This amount was recorded over two days, according to a live tracker maintained by developer Ryan Murphy from The Marshall Project. Although this tally is unofficial and based on ActBlue’s historical data since 2004, it offers insights into the group’s fundraising achievements ahead of mandatory disclosures.
On Sunday alone, contributions reached $66.9 million for the launch of Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the largest fundraising day for ActBlue in the 2024 election cycle. This surpassed the previous high for donations on September 30, 2020, during the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
With the surge in donations, ActBlue surpassed $14 billion in total cash raised since its inception two decades ago. In contrast, its Republican counterpart, WinRed, which began accepting donations in late 2019, has raised approximately $4.3 billion, as reported by OpenSecrets.
ActBlue noted on X, formerly known as Twitter, that many individuals reported making their first-ever donations within the last 24 hours, highlighting the motivation of new small-dollar donors joining the grassroots movement.
In addition, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, reported receiving $150 million in new commitments from major donors within 24 hours of Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris. Meanwhile, Swing Left, which initiated a fund to support the future Democratic nominee, stated that it raised over $160,000 in the same timeframe.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, expressed confidence in the financing of Harris’s campaign, while prominent Democratic donors George and Alex Soros have also shown their support.
Historically, Biden’s most successful fundraising periods occurred after significant events, such as his defeat by Trump during a televised debate on June 27, where he and his committees raised about $28 million within a day. Additionally, Biden collected $19.2 million following Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts, while Trump and his affiliated groups raised $69 million in the immediate aftermath of his conviction on May 30. The influx of donors caused a temporary crash of Trump’s campaign website, and an associated super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., raised $70 million that month.
From April to June, pro-Biden entities secured $332.4 million, while pro-Trump groups gathered $431.2 million, as reported by The Financial Times. By the end of June, Biden held $281 million in cash compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.