Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not seek re-election, Democrats raised $100 million through their primary fundraising platform, ActBlue. The total was reported over a two-day span, according to a live tracker maintained by Ryan Murphy, a developer at The Marshall Project. While this figure is unofficial and based on ActBlue’s comprehensive donation history since 2004, it highlights the group’s fundraising momentum ahead of mandated disclosures.
On Sunday alone, donors contributed $66.9 million to kick off Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the most significant fundraising day in the 2024 cycle for ActBlue. The second-largest fundraising day occurred on September 30, 2020, when Biden and Trump faced off in their first presidential debate, according to Murphy’s data.
This surge in donations enabled ActBlue to surpass $14 billion in total fundraising since its inception two decades ago. In contrast, WinRed, its Republican counterpart founded in late 2019, has recorded approximately $4.3 billion in donations, as per OpenSecrets.
ActBlue shared that many new donors reported making their first-ever contributions in the last 24 hours. The group expressed excitement about the joining of these grassroots supporters 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’s announcement and Harris’s endorsement, as reported by Politico. Swing Left reported raising over $160,000 in just a day to support the eventual Democratic nominee.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, indicated on Monday that Harris’s campaign will be well-funded, and prominent Democratic donors such as George and Alex Soros have also shown support for her candidacy.
Historically, Biden has seen significant fundraising boosts following key political events. After a debate defeat against Trump on June 27, Biden’s team raised about $28 million in the following days. Additionally, Biden raised $19.2 million shortly after Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts, while Trump and his affiliated groups garnered $69 million in the days surrounding the conviction. Trump’s campaign website experienced temporary outages due to the influx of donations. The month also saw the super PAC Make America Great Again Inc. raise $70 million.
Between April and June, pro-Biden groups raised $332.4 million, while pro-Trump groups collected $431.2 million, according to The Financial Times. By the end of June, Biden held $281 million in available funds compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.