Biden, DNC raise $71 million in third quarter

President Joe Biden, the Democratic National Committee and their joint fundraising committees brought in more than $71 million combined in this year’s third quarter, the campaign said Sunday.

It’s a large, though not record-breaking, amount that has allowed Biden to launch a major TV and digital advertising campaign earlier than past presidents’ reelection efforts.

The pro-Biden team announced that it had nearly $91 million on hand — a historic high for Democratic presidential candidates at this point in the cycle, according to the campaign, and the byproduct of running a purposefully lean operation. Biden, the DNC and their committees also said that upwards of 493,000 donors contributed to them this past fundraising period.

While running for reelection, then-President Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee raised a larger amount, $125 million, during the third quarter of 2019. They had $156 million in the bank at the time.

Biden’s team brought in a hair more than the nearly $70 million then-President Barack Obama and the DNC raised in the third quarter of 2011. However, contribution limits are higher now than they were over a decade ago. The pro-Obama effort had more donors, over 606,000 people, in that fundraising period.

Biden aides expressed confidence in their fundraising bounty and small-dollar donor army. They said 34 percent of their “donor universe” is made up of new contributors since Biden’s 2020 presidential bid. Donors gave a total of 843,000 contributions to Biden, the DNC and their committees in the months of July, August and September, they said, and 97 percent of those donations were under $200.

“This quarter’s fundraising haul and historic cash on hand speak to the very real enthusiasm and support President Biden and Vice President Harris continue to build for their reelection bid,” said Julie Chavez Rodriguez, Biden’s campaign manager, in a statement. “We are especially proud of our efforts to exponentially grow our grassroots donor base, now having over a hundred thousand Americans signed up to donate on a recurring basis from now until Election Day.”

The Biden campaign said that its “Meet the Presidents” contest featuring Biden and Obama was its most successful contest since 2020, bringing in almost $2.5 million. Its “Dark Brandon” merchandise was also lucrative, with the meme’s mugs and Biden’s direct-to-camera videos touting them raising nearly $2 million since August.

Biden campaign officials sounded a note of caution in comparing his third-quarter figures to Trump’s in 2019, arguing that the former president’s fundraising operation spent a large chunk of money to raise the amount it did.

The third quarter of the year is often a slower time for fundraising for candidates. But Biden and DNC kept roughly even this period with their $72 million haul last quarter.

Though Biden has struggled with fundraising in the past, he brought in a record-breaking amount in 2020 while running against Trump.

Trump, now the GOP frontrunner to take on Biden in a rematch, announced that his joint fundraising committee raised nearly $46 million in the third quarter this year. That cash is divided between his campaign and Save America political action committee. Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, said he brought in $15 million.

The joint fundraising committees that are factored into the Biden team’s figures are the Biden Victory Fund, Biden Action Fund and Democratic Grassroots Victory Fund. The Biden campaign said it, the DNC and those entities held 75 fundraisers since the president’s reelection bid launched in April, including 37 in the latest quarter.