$26 million from grassroots donations, half of which were from first-time donors. Looks like the base isn’t too concerned with all of that beltway pearl clutching demanding Joe Biden step down following the debate.
Here’s more on that from The Hill:
President Biden’s campaign has raked in more than $33 million since his debate with former President Trump last week despite some backlash about his performance.
In an email on Sunday, a Biden campaign official said they had raised more than $33 million since Thursday’s debate, including $26 million from grassroots donations. This fundraising haul comes despite some Democrats’ concerns about Biden’s lackluster performance last week.
The campaign said that nearly half of its grassroots donations came from first-time donors in the 2024 election cycle, noting that Thursday was “our best grassroots fundraising day ever, while Friday was the second best.”
The official said they have more recurring donations at this point in the 2024 cycle than at the same time in 2020, which they said is “a major indicator of grassroots support and fundraising sustainability.”
Former White House Communications Director Kate Bedingfield was asked about response to the debate on this Sunday’s State of the Union on CNN, and brought up the fundraising numbers, and the fact that a lot of voters were really disturbed by what they witnessed from Trump as well:
BASH: What is the reality of what is now happening behind the scenes?
BEDINGFIELD: Well, I think the reality is that the race has not fundamentally changed.
I think there’s universal agreement. It wasn’t a great night for Joe Biden. He said as much. But what we see in all the data that has emerged since Thursday is the fundamental head-to-head hasn’t shifted. People are not suddenly moving to Trump. In fact, what we have seen is that people felt like Trump’s arguments were not persuasive.
They were concerned about what he said about January 6. They were concerned about him saying he wouldn’t accept the results of the election. So, fundamentally, on the places Donald Trump is politically vulnerable, he really did himself a huge disservice on Thursday night.
And so I think, for Biden now, the task is to go out, do what he did in North Carolina, show that energy, show that it was just one bad night. Every campaign recovers from one bad night. And I think you see it in — you had, the Biden campaign put out their fund-raising numbers.
They have raised $33 million since the debate; $26 million was grassroots, including I think half of that was first-time donors. They’re seeing people show up at offices around the country to volunteer. I think people were motivated and energized by what they saw from Trump. They don’t want him to be in office.
And I think the Biden campaign is now going to harness that energy.
Let’s hope so. It would be chaos to hold a brokered convention. Biden is our nominee. We rally around him or we get Trump again. Bad debate or not he’s been one of the better presidents in my lifetime, and nothing’s changed in that regard following the debacle of a debate.
