Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not seek re-election, Democrats successfully raised $100 million from donors through ActBlue, their main fundraising platform.
According to Ryan Murphy, a developer at The Marshall Project, the impressive amount was recorded over a two-day span. While the total is not officially verified and relies on ActBlue’s own tracking system established since 2004, it offers insight into the fundraising momentum ahead of mandatory disclosures.
On Sunday alone, contributors provided $66.9 million to support Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the most significant fundraising day for ActBlue in the 2024 election cycle. The second-highest fundraising day occurred on September 30, 2020, during the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
Due to the considerable donations received, ActBlue surpassed $14 billion in total raised since its inception two decades ago. In contrast, WinRed, its Republican counterpart launched in late 2019, has collected approximately $4.3 billion, according to OpenSecrets.
ActBlue expressed enthusiasm about the influx of new donors, stating, “We’ve seen so many folks saying they made their first ever donation in the last 24 hours!” This surge was described as motivating for the grassroots movement.
Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from major donors within 24 hours of Biden’s declaration and Harris’s endorsement, as reported by Politico. Additionally, Swing Left announced it raised over $160,000 in the same timeframe to support the eventual Democratic nominee.
Evercore founder Roger Altman remarked that Harris’s campaign will be “very well financed” and confirmed his support for her. Notably, Democratic megadonors George and Alex Soros have also endorsed Harris.
Previously, Biden’s peak fundraising days occurred shortly after he was defeated by Trump in a televised debate on June 27, when he and his committees raised about $28 million by June 28, according to analysis from the New York Times.
Post-Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden managed to raise $19.2 million, while Trump and associated groups amassed $69 million between May 30 and May 31. This surge of support temporarily crashed Trump’s campaign website. Trump-aligned super PAC Make America Great Again Inc. raised $70 million that month.
From April to June, pro-Biden groups collected $332.4 million, while pro-Trump groups garnered $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.