Biden, DNC stretch cash lead, say March donations top $90M
WILMINGTON, Del. — President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign and the Democratic National Committee said Saturday that they raised more than $90 million in March and ended the year’s first quarter with $192 million-plus in cash on hand, further stretching their financial advantage over Donald Trump and the Republicans.
The Biden campaign and its affiliated entities reported collecting $187 million from January through March and said that 96% of all donations were less than $200.
That total was bolstered by the more than $26 million Biden reported raising from a March 28 event at Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan that featured former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.
Biden’s campaign says the pace of donations has allowed it to undertake major digital and television advertising campaigns in key states and to work with the DNC and state parties to better mobilize would-be supporters before the November election.
The campaign said the total as of March 31 was the highest by any Democratic candidate. About 1.6 million people have donated since Biden announced in April 2023 that he was seeking a second term. And the campaign raised more than $10 million in the 24 hours after the president’s State of the Union speech in early March.
“The money we are raising is historic, and it’s going to the critical work of building a winning operation focused solely on the voters who will decide this election — offices across the country, staff in our battleground states and a paid media program meeting voters where they are,” Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement.
“It’s a stark contract to Trump’s cash-strapped operation that is funneling the limited and billionaire-reliant funds it has to pay off his various legal fees,” she added.
Trump fundraiser: Donald Trump’s campaign was expecting to raise more than $40 million Saturday when major donors gathered for his biggest fundraiser yet.
The event in Palm Beach, Florida, at the home of billionaire investor John Paulson, is expected to bring in $43 million for the former president’s third run for the White House, according to Paulson.
The high-dollar event was expected to include about 100 guests, including more than a few billionaires, and top a new single-event fundraising record set March 28 by President Joe Biden that netted $26 million.
The event, billed as the “Inaugural Leadership Dinner,” sends a signal of a resurgence of Trump and the Republican Party’s fundraising, which has struggled to catch up to Biden and the Democrats.
Trump and the GOP announced earlier in the week that they raised more than $65.6 million in March and closed out the month with $93.1 million.
Sanders office fire: Police in Vermont are seeking a suspect who allegedly started a fire Friday outside the office of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders. The blaze caused minor damage but no injuries.
Authorities say an unknown male suspect sprayed what they described
as a possible accelerant on the office door, set it on fire and fled. They said the suspect remained at large and no motive had been established.
Sanders, an independent allied with the Democratic Party, was not at the office.
Detergent recall: Procter & Gamble is recalling more than 8 million bags of Tide, Gain, Ace and Ariel laundry detergent packets sold in the U.S. and Canada due to a defect in the products’ child-resistant packaging.
According to Friday notices from both P&G and product-safety regulators in the U.S. and Canada, the outer packaging meant to prevent easy access to the liquid laundry detergent pods can split open near the zipper track, posing serious risks to children and others who may ingest them, in addition to possible skin or eye injuries.
So far, there have been no confirmed injuries tied to the defect.
The recall applies to select batches of detergents manufactured between September 2023 and February 2024.
Consumers in possession of the recalled bags are instructed to keep the products out of the reach and sight of children and contact P&G for a full refund and replacement child-resistant bag to store the detergent, which remains safe to use for laundry purposes.