Candidates boast of reaching $1M
Democrats claim they have 2020 fundraising chops.
Washington WASHINGTON — Gov. Jay Inslee, little known outside his home state, boasts he raised over $1 million in the days after launching his White House bid. Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper and others say they did, too.
Impressive numbers, even if dwarfed by the $6 million or so reported by Bernie Sanders and Beto O’Rourke.
The seven-digit figures for the lesser-known Democratic hopefuls don’t lie, but they don’t tell the whole story either. Early bursts of donations don’t happen by accident, especially for candidates with little national name recognition such as Inslee, who hit his target thanks in part to an email list of donors he’s cultivated for months.
He’s among a crowded field of more than a dozen Democrats who are feverishly trying to show they can raise big money and realistically challenge Republican President Donald Trump. With the first-quarter fundraising deadline looming, some are straining credulity to give the impression of a spontaneous groundswell of support.
In addition to Inslee and Hickenlooper, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar and California Sen. Kamala Harris have boasted they raised $1 million or more in the hours and days after launching their campaigns. What that signifies is less clear.
“It’s a strange goal post for viability, and there are a lot of tricks you can use to come up with that number,” said Tim Lim, a Democratic strategist who worked for Hillary Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s campaigns. However, he added: “It’s a great talking point.”
Candidates like Vermont Sen. Sanders and former Texas Rep. O’Rourke have used their star power to quickly raise astronomical sums. O’Rourke announced on Monday that he edged Sanders by pulling in $6.1 million in the 24 hours after his launch.
A wide range of tools is available to help lesser-known White House hopefuls. They include rented fundraisings email lists, targeted social media ads (which all candidates use) and revenue-sharing agreements, which allow interest groups to raise money for their own causes while splitting it with a candidate. Fundraising commitments are often lined up in advance, while creative accounting can be used to pad the bottom line.
Senators have a leg up. They can take money from existing federal campaign accounts, while governors are largely barred from doing the same with state accounts.
Before his early March launch, Inslee spent months running targeted ads that asked Facebook users to fork over their email addresses to join his fight against climate change — now the signature issue of his campaign. Inslee, who was then head of the Democratic Governors Association, made prospecting trips to states including New York and California.
He started collecting larger checks from conventional donors in the weeks before the launch. Then, shortly after announcing his run, his campaign blasted out thousands of fundraising emails and the online money started to roll in.