Harris Campaign raises $540m in latest war chest to prevent Trump from returning to the White House
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Donors poured in $82 million for Kamala Harris during the Democratic National Convention (DNC) that spanned August 19 to 22, the last day of which the United States Vice President accepted her nomination to head the ticket of the party in the battle to prevent Donald Trump regaining the White House he desecrated in his first term.
Unlike Bola Tinubu’s reliance on and deployment of his bullion van in Nigeria, money does not buy election in America, it only facilitates media advertising campaigns, finances state campaign offices, and grassroots mobilization by foot soldiers.
The foot soldiers are mostly volunteers who operate phone banks and knock door-to-door at the homes of prospective voters (speaking to them to vote for a particular candidate, and handling out flyers, but never money or food items, the Nigerian way).
The Harris campaign disclosed on Sunday the fund haul brings to $540 million the war chest of Harris, who makes history as the first female as well as the first Black and Asian person to have a decent shot at becoming the President of the US, the most powerful country in the world.
Democrats say pro-Harris groups have raised over $500 million since Joe Biden left the race on July 21 and endorsed her to replace him.
Forbes reports the Biden – now Harris – campaign committee raised $516.8 million and Trump’s campaign committee raised $268.5 million in total between January 2023 and July 31, 2024, the most recent date for which Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings are available.
The Harris campaign raised $204.5 million in July alone, while the Trump campaign raised $47.5 million, shaking up what was previously a more evenly-matched cash race (Biden had raised $284.1 million and Trump $217.2 million in total as of the end of June).
Harris entered the race on July 21 and quickly posted huge fundraising numbers, with her campaign reporting $81 million in donations in the first 24 hours of her campaign.
The fundraising surge reportedly continued into August: On August 25, the campaign said Harris For President and allied groups had raised a combined $540 million since Biden dropped out, including some $82 million during the DNC (those fundraising totals won’t be verified until official August data is released next month).
The New York Times adds that national party conventions are typically big-money moments for presidential candidates, offering nominees four days of lightly mediated exposure to a broad, if partisan audience.
Harris has been on a historic fund-raising tear ever since Biden announced on July 21 he would no longer seek the Democratic nomination. The party convention, which took place in Chicago, was full of messaging encouraging big and small donors alike to give to Harris’s campaign.
After her speech accepting the Democratic nomination on Thursday night, the Harris campaign saw its “best fund-raising hour since launch day,” the campaign’s chair, Jen O’Malley Dillon, wrote in a memo on Sunday, although she did not provide a specific amount.
A third of the week’s donations were from first-time contributors, indicating Harris’s ability to tap into donors that Biden did not have when he was the presumptive Democratic nominee, the memo said.
Two-thirds of the first-time donors were women, the campaign explained.
“The enthusiasm and energy at the United Center this week was palpable,” O’Malley Dillon wrote. “But that enthusiasm extended well beyond Chicago, spreading far and wide throughout the battleground states that will decide this election.”
The campaign said the fundraising – which cannot be independently confirmed until its next finance reports are filed – reflects totals raised across Harris for President, the Democratic National Committee and joint fundraising committees.
Volunteers also signed up for nearly 200,000 shifts during the convention week, which marked the biggest week of organizing since the start of the campaign, the memo said.
The $82 million total includes contributions to allied fund-raising committees with the state and national parties.
The memo did not give day-by-day totals, but ActBlue, which processes online donations for many progressive causes, including Harris’s bid, reported that its platform raised $13 million on Monday, $16.5 million on Tuesday, $23 million on Wednesday and almost $37 million on Thursday.
Trump did not release similar fund-raising numbers after his party’s convention in Milwaukee last month. While he was competitive with Biden in political fund-raising through 2024, Harris opened a $50 million cash-on-hand advantage at the beginning of August, after she had ascended to the top of the Democratic ticket.
The $82 million raised during the four days of the DNC is roughly on par with the $81 million the Harris campaign said it raised in the first 24 hours after Biden’s decision to drop out.
Harris and her allied committees reported having $377 million cash on hand going into August, compared with $327 million for Trump and allies. That gap appears likely to widen over the month of August.
None of this accounts for the well-funded super PACs [Political Action Committees] in support of each candidate, which have already begun flooding the airwaves with ads.
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