Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not run for re-election, Democrats raised $100 million from donors through their primary fundraising vehicle. ActBlue, a fundraising platform for Democratic organizations, documented this amount over the past two days, according to a live tracker maintained by Ryan Murphy from The Marshall Project. While this tally is unofficial, it provides insight into fundraising efforts ahead of required disclosures.
On Sunday, contributions totaled $66.9 million for the launch of Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the highest one-day fundraising total for the 2024 election cycle on ActBlue. The previous record for donations came on September 30, 2020, coinciding with the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
Thanks to the surge of donations, ActBlue has raised a total of $14 billion since its inception two decades ago. In comparison, WinRed, the Republican fundraising platform established in late 2019, has collected approximately $4.3 billion since its launch.
ActBlue reported a significant number of first-time donors in the past 24 hours, highlighting the excitement surrounding new contributions to the grassroots movement. Additionally, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from major donors shortly after Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris, as reported by Politico. Swing Left, which has created a fund to support the eventual Democratic nominee, raised over $160,000 within the same time frame.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, expressed on Monday that he believes Harris’s campaign will be “very well financed” and confirmed his support for her. Prominent Democratic donors, including George and Alex Soros, are also backing Harris.
Previously, Biden’s most significant fundraising days occurred following his debates with former President Donald Trump. Following a televised debate defeat on June 27, Biden’s committees collected around $28 million in just two days. In the wake of Trump’s criminal conviction on 34 counts, Biden raised $19.2 million, while Trump and his associated groups collected $69 million during a similar timeframe. This influx of donations caused a brief crash of Trump’s campaign website. In the same month, the super PAC aligned with Trump, Make America Great Again Inc., raised $70 million.
From April to June, pro-Biden organizations raised $332.4 million, whereas pro-Trump groups amassed $431.2 million, according to The Financial Times. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million available compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.