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Former Vice President Joe Biden raised over $140 million in the month of June and handily outraised President Donald Trump in his first full quarter as the likely Democratic nominee, in what’s shaping up to be a billion-dollar race for the presidency.
Biden, the Democratic National Committee, and their joint fundraising committees raised $141 million during June, while Trump and the Republican National Committee took in $131 million.
Trump has had a head start on fundraising, having been the likely Republican nominee since, well, 2017. Biden was still competing against Sen. Bernie Sanders into the month of April, but after Biden won primaries in Wisconsin on April 7 and Alaska on April 10, Sanders suspended his campaign and endorsed Biden on April 13.
But since April 1, Biden has raised $281.2 million, and Trump has pulled in $266 million.
It’s part of an overall trend that’s heavily favoring Democrats overall heading into the fall. The Democratic digital fundraising platform ActBlue registered $392 million in June alone. WinRed, the GOP’s newer counterpart, hasn’t released its most recent numbers yet but last week reported raising $450 million in its first year of operations, according to Axios.
Democrats have the upper hand in polling, as well as in fundraising: recent polling has shown Biden opening up a wide lead over Trump nationally and edging him in most swing states, while several Senate Republican incumbents who need to win in order for the GOP to keep its majority, such as Sen. Martha McSally of Arizona and Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, appear to be in trouble.
The Biden campaign’s average online donation in June was $34 and the most common occupation was educator, according to the Biden campaign. The campaign also received a surge of new support: 68% of the campaign’s donors in June were first-time donors, and more than 2.6 million signed up for the campaign’s email list last month, they said.
“It’s clear that voters are looking for steady leadership, experience, empathy, compassion, and character—and they’ll find all of these qualities in Vice President Joe Biden,” campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon said in an email to supporters.
It’s still likely that Trump maintains an overall cash advantage over Biden, however, as the Trump campaign reported having $295 million on hand on Wednesday. The Biden campaign didn’t disclose their cash on hand figure, which won’t be publicly available until later this month.
“The Trump campaign’s monumental June fundraising haul proves that people are voting with their wallets and that enthusiasm behind President Trump’s reelection is only growing,” campaign manager Brad Parscale said in a statement about the president’s fundraising total, released before the Biden campaign released theirs. “No one is excited about Joe Biden, which is why he has to rely so heavily on surrogates like Barack Obama and radical Hollywood elites."
Cover: Democratic presidential candidate, former Vice President Joe Biden speaks at Alexis Dupont High School in Wilmington, Del., Tuesday, June 30, 2020. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
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