‘Incredible enthusiasm’: Joe Biden, DNC report $72M haul in Q2

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President Joe Biden’s campaign announced a more than $72 million fundraising haul with the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and its joint fundraising committees between April and June.

The sum is more than the combined Q2 gains the campaigns of both former President Donald Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis reported earlier this month. However, it’s well short of the $105 million Trump and the Republican National Committee raised during the same period four years ago.

By the end of June, the Biden campaign, the DNC and its committees held $77 million altogether — the “highest total amassed by a Democrat at any comparable point in history,” a campaign press note said.

The campaign did not break down how the fundraising was split between each organization. It noted more than 394,000 donors made more than 670,000 contributions. Of those, 97% were for less than $200 and 30% had not previously given to the campaign.

Donations came from all 50 states and “all walks of life,” the campaign said. The average grassroots contribution was $39, and teachers, nurses and retirees represented “some of the most common occupations of donors.”

“We’ve seen incredible enthusiasm for President Biden and Vice President (Kamala) Harris’ agenda — including their commitment to restoring democracy, fighting for more freedoms and growing the economy by growing the middle class. While Republicans are burning through resources in a divisive Primary focused on who can take the most extreme MAGA positions, we are significantly outraising every single one of them — because our team’s strength is our grassroots supporters,” Biden-Harris Campaign Manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement.

“Americans know the stakes in this election — and our broad, diverse coalition powered by grassroots donors is going to send Joe Biden and Kamala Harris back to the White House to finish the job.”

The Biden campaign’s reported Q2 fundraising is more than double the $35 million Trump pulled in since June and more than triple what DeSantis took in over the same stretch.

Never Back Down, a super PAC dedicated exclusively to putting DeSantis in the White House, also amassed $130 million since March, though close to two-thirds of the money came from a Florida state committee that backed DeSantis’ 2022 re-election campaign.

Responding to the announcement Friday, former 2012 Barack Obama campaign manager Jim Messina called the numbers “incredibly impressive.”

“And they’re impressive for two reasons. One is the pace of them. Per day, they’re faster than even the Obama 2011 numbers. And two … there’s real cash-on-hand,” he told MSNBC. “I mean, they’re spending very little money. They’re holding this money for next year, when they’re actually going to need it. It’s a very slimmed-down and very smartly run operation.”

He continued, “The other number that really strikes out is that Biden outraised all the Republicans combined … so there’s a whole bunch of Democrats who woke up this morning to these numbers feeling pretty good about where Joe Biden’s campaign is six months before the Iowa caucus.”

Sunshine State progressives applauded Biden’s gains as well. Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried celebrated the announcement while also taking shots at DeSantis’ job as the state’s chief executive.

“Voters aren’t stupid. They see a clear difference between Joe Biden’s America and Ron DeSantis’ Florida. Because of Ron’s failed economic policies, inflation in Florida is almost double the national average and major insurers are fleeing the state. While Ron’s campaign is obsessed with culture wars, Democrats are laser-focused on building an economy that works for average Americans,” she said.

“The Free State of Florida isn’t free, it’s unfathomable — and if the Florida Men running for president get their way, America will be too. That’s why Florida Democrats will do everything in our power to create a broad, diverse coalition that can send Joe Biden and Kamala Harris back to the White House to finish the job they started.”