Joe Biden Is Sprinting to the Fourth Quarter Fundraising Deadline

President Joe Biden has looked to press one of his most significant 2024 advantages in recent weeks – the prolific rate he and Democrats can raise money – headlining a range of top-dollar fundraising events as the fourth and final quarter of 2023 comes to a close.

The urgency reflects a belief inside Biden’s inner circle: Fundraising is one area where Biden has a distinct edge, both because his would-be opponents are currently mired in a costly primary and because Democrats generally have had the distinct upper hand on fundraising over Republicans.

“It's gigantic,” Jeffrey Katzenberg, a prolific Democratic fundraiser and co-chair of Biden’s re-election campaign. “Every dollar he is raising is being allocated towards November 5, 2024. On the other side, everybody else today is trying to figure out how to survive the primary gauntlet.”

The former chairman of Walt Disney Studios and founder of DreamWorks Pictures added: “They’re all spending their money fighting one another while Donald Trump seems to be spending most of his money trying to stay out of jail.”

Biden’s most high-profile fundraising swing came this month when the president headlined a slate of events in California, including one hosted by famed director Steven Spielberg and noted television producer Shonda Rhimes. Katzenberg, the longtime top fundraiser, said his stint in Los Angeles alone raised over $15 million, topping what then-President Barack Obama raised during a similar Los Angeles trip in May 2012.

“The trip to LA, on every measure and metric, could not have been more successful,” he said.

But Biden has also recently headlined events in the Philadelphia area, Washington, D.C., Maryland and Massachusetts, bringing in millions for his reelection bid.

And on Thursday in Washington, D.C., a group of Biden’s top financial supporters and fundraisers will gather for a day-long briefing from the campaign. Top aides from the Wilmington-based operation will brief these wealthy donors on the state of the campaign, the challenges they face and how they see 2024 playing out.

"There is a deep appreciation [from donors] for how much President Biden has gotten done. It may not have translated yet to all the voters and that is the job ahead of us,” Katzenberg said. “However to donors, whether it's grassroots or high-end, they really appreciate what an incredible job he's done.”

The reason this is a clear advantage for Biden is that he can ask these donors for the maximum amount of money allowed by the Federal Election Commission, given he has already signed a joint fundraising agreement with the Democratic National Committee, all 50 Democratic state parties and a host of other Democratic committees.

That means one donor can give Biden up to  $929,600, something that Republican donors may be able to do at some point but can’t do yet because the Republican National Committee and associated committees have not inked a joint fundraising agreement with anyone, despite former President Donald Trump being the runaway favorite in the party’s primary. Currently, Republican donors are only allowed to raise $3,300 to their primary campaign accounts, and donors cannot give to the other committees through their chosen presidential campaign’s joint fundraising agreement.

Biden’s advantage is about more than just top-dollar donors, however. As Biden crisscrosses the country to raise money from top dollar donors, the president’s campaign back in Wilmington is focused on boosting its engagement from grassroots donors, those Americans who buy a product from the campaign’s store or give small-dollar donations online.

According to a source close to the Biden campaign, November was the campaign’s biggest grassroots fundraising month since its launch in April, a figure that gives his team confidence its small-dollar network will continue to grow into 2024.

The source added that Biden’s top operatives are well aware that Obama raised $68 million in the fourth quarter of 2011 – the same point in his reelection campaign that Biden’s at now. Topping that figure, the source said, would be seen as a successful quarter inside the campaign.

After officially announcing his re-election campaign a few weeks into the second quarter, Biden said he and his joint fundraising vehicle had raised more than $72 million in those three months. The Democrat raised nearly that in the third quarter, bringing in $71 million in those three months.