Just a day after President Joe Biden announced he would not pursue re-election, Democrats raised $100 million from contributors via their primary fundraising platform. ActBlue, a political action committee dedicated to Democratic fundraising, reported this amount over the past two days, as noted by Ryan Murphy, a developer at The Marshall Project. While the figure is not officially confirmed, it illustrates the group’s fundraising performance ahead of any mandated disclosures.
On Sunday, donors contributed $66.9 million to kick off Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign, marking the largest fundraising day in the 2024 cycle for ActBlue. The second-highest fundraising day on record was September 30, 2020, coinciding with the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump.
The spike in donations on Sunday pushed ActBlue’s total to $14 billion collected since its inception two decades ago. In contrast, WinRed, the Republican fundraising platform that began in late 2019, has raised approximately $4.3 billion, according to OpenSecrets.
ActBlue expressed its enthusiasm on X, formerly known as Twitter, stating that many donors reported making their first-ever contributions in the last 24 hours, showcasing the energizing effect of new small-dollar donors joining the grassroots effort.
Future Forward, a super PAC aligned with Biden, secured $150 million in new commitments from significant donors within a day of Biden’s announcement and endorsement of Harris. Additionally, Swing Left, which has established a fund to support the eventual Democratic nominee, reported raising over $160,000 within 24 hours.
On Monday, Evercore founder Roger Altman commented that Harris’s campaign would be “very well financed” and expressed his support for her. Major Democratic donors, including George and Alex Soros, have also backed Harris.
Previously, Biden experienced significant fundraising days following his loss to Trump in a televised debate on June 27, raising about $28 million from that date to June 28, according to an analysis by The New York Times.
Following Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden raised $19.2 million, while Trump and his affiliated organizations generated $69 million from May 30 to May 31, causing a temporary crash of Trump’s campaign website. The super PAC aligned with him, Make America Great Again Inc., also raised $70 million that month.
Between April and June, pro-Biden groups raised a total of $332.4 million, whereas pro-Trump groups received $431.2 million, The Financial Times reported. By the end of June, Biden had $281 million in his campaign account compared to Trump’s $336.2 million.