Just one day after President Joe Biden announced he would not seek re-election, the Democratic Party managed to raise $100 million through its primary fundraising platform, ActBlue.
According to a live tracker managed by Ryan Murphy from The Marshall Project, this impressive amount was accumulated over two days. While this figure is not officially verified and is based on ActBlue’s comprehensive donation data since 2004, it offers insight into the organization’s fundraising performance ahead of any formal disclosures.
On Sunday alone, donors contributed $66.9 million in support of Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the highest single-day fundraising in the 2024 cycle for ActBlue. The previous record was set on September 30, 2020, during the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
The spike in donations allowed ActBlue to reach a total of $14 billion raised since its establishment 20 years ago. In contrast, its Republican counterpart, WinRed, launched in late 2019, has raised approximately $4.3 billion.
ActBlue expressed enthusiasm about the influx of new contributions, stating that many donors reported making their first-ever donations in the past 24 hours. This surge has been described as a motivating factor for the grassroots movement.
In addition, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, reportedly secured $150 million in new commitments from major donors shortly after Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris. Swing Left, which has initiated a fund to support the eventual Democratic nominee, revealed it raised over $160,000 within the same timeframe.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, commented that Harris’s campaign would be “very well financed” and extended his support to her. Notable Democratic donors, including George and Alex Soros, have also shown backing for Harris.
Historically, Biden’s most significant fundraising boosts were observed following his defeat by Trump during a televised debate on June 27, when he and his committees raised approximately $28 million in the subsequent days. Similarly, Biden garnered $19.2 million after Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts, while Trump and his affiliated groups raised $69 million in the following days, causing a brief crash of his campaign website. In that same month, a related super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., collected $70 million.
Between April and June, pro-Biden entities raised $332.4 million, whereas pro-Trump groups amassed $431.2 million. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million in available funds, compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.