The presidential campaign of Kamala Harris has seen more than $250 million coming in political contributions in just three days after President Joe Biden bowed out of the race. The staggering spike has confounded poll pundits who thought she would be a weak candidate and Trump would stomp her on the money front.
Explanations for the windfall in funding, including over $100 million in the 24 hours since Biden bequeathed the nomination to her, include pent-up energy and money from donors who wanted Biden out.
Many Democrat donors dismayed with Biden’s debate debacle had held back contributions – in what was dubbed a “Dembargo” – to pressure the president into quitting the race. His exit appears to have uncorked the money spigot.
While big donors from Hollywood and Silicon Valley account for a large portion of the windfall, the Harris campaign is also thrilled that 60% of the contributions have come from first-time donors, an indication that a new cohort of voters who did not give to Biden have emerged from the political base.
The campaign also reported a surge in volunteer sign-ups, enrolling 58,000 since she replaced the prez at the top of the ticket, a sign-up rate that one report said is 232 times larger than Biden campaign’s daily average. This would suggest that many youngsters who had distanced themselves from the battle of geriatrics are now enthused by the much younger Harris, who is 59, and are “drivin’ up the jiving”.
Many Silicon Valley honchos said they are now opening their cheque books after holding back for weeks because of the uncertainty over whether Biden would continue.
One Google executive who plans to hold a fundraiser for Harris – who was born in and grew up in Oakland in California’s Bay Area – told Washington Post that a lot of people in the tech world were “paralysed in the last few weeks” and “now we are seeing the floodgates have opened”. But Trump campaign officials maintain it is just a brief bump arising from Harris’ elevation, and the industry’s mistrust of govt and regulations will be hard to overcome.
Incidentally, while California and New York fork out much of the campaign lolly, most of it will be spend – on ads, maintaining campaign offices, voter outreach etc. – in the so-called battleground states that will determine the poll outcome. They include “Blue Wall” states – Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania – and the “Sun Belt” stretch – Arizona, Nevada, Georgia and North Carolina, all of which Trump and Harris will be traversing soon.
