Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not run for re-election, the Democratic Party raised $100 million from donors via its primary fundraising platform. ActBlue, a political action committee and fundraising platform for Democratic organizations, reported this immense total within a span of 48 hours, according to live tracking by Ryan Murphy at The Marshall Project. While this figure is not official and stems from ActBlue’s own tracking system since 2004, it reflects the group’s fundraising performance prior to the forthcoming required disclosures.
On Sunday alone, fundraising for Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign surged to $66.9 million, marking the highest single-day fundraising effort for the 2024 election cycle on ActBlue. The next highest day for donations was noted on September 30, 2020, when Biden and Trump faced off in their first presidential debate, as per Murphy’s tracker.
Thanks to the influx of contributions on Sunday, ActBlue reached the milestone of raising $14 billion since its inception two decades ago. In contrast, WinRed, the Republican fundraising platform launched in late 2019, has accumulated approximately $4.3 billion in donations since its start.
ActBlue shared a statement on X, formerly known as Twitter, highlighting the excitement among new donors: “We’ve seen so many folks saying they made their first ever donation in the last 24 hours! It’s so motivating to see new small-dollar donors join the grassroots movement!”
Additionally, Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from major donors within 24 hours following Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris. Swing Left, which supports the eventual Democratic nominee, reported raising over $160,000 in the same timeframe.
Roger Altman, founder of Evercore, expressed confidence on Monday about Harris’s campaign being “very well financed” and pledged his support. Prominent Democratic donors, including George and Alex Soros, have also voiced their support for Harris.
Earlier in his campaign, Biden experienced substantial fundraising in the aftermath of a televised debate defeat to Trump on June 27, raising around $28 million within a day. Following Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden raised $19.2 million in the subsequent days. In contrast, Trump and his affiliated groups gathered $69 million from the day of his conviction to the following day, causing a temporary crash of Trump’s campaign website. His aligned super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., garnered $70 million that same month.
From April to June, groups supporting Biden raised $332.4 million while pro-Trump organizations amassed $431.2 million. By the close of June, Biden had $281 million in available funds compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.