With the final fundraising quarter of the year ending at midnight on Tuesday, most presidential campaigns have stressed meeting financial benchmarks ahead of the end-of-year deadline.Â
Sen. Bernie Sanders’ team, however, has focused less on monetary goals than having the campaign reach the threshold of 5 million individual donations by the end of 2019.
Sanders, who has championed small dollar donations, has created a fundraising juggernaut that has consistently outperformed other Democratic candidates throughout the year — the latest figures are expected to show Sanders has raised almost $30 million since October.
Faiz Shakir, Sanders’ campaign manager, sent out an email to supporters Monday, telling them this is the most important financial deadline of the election as they head into the final stretch before the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary.
“We’re not where we need to be before this deadline to pull it off,” Shakir wrote. “This 5 million goal is about the difference between victory and defeat.”
As of Monday, Sanders had raised about $26 million — already $1 million more than he brought in during the third quarter — but was hoping to raise more than $2 million more before the midnight deadline, according to the New York Times.
Tim Tagaris, one of the architects of the Vermont senator’s fundraising strategy, tweeted Monday the campaign would need “two big days” to “reach that 5 million donation goal.”
“But we’re off to a very strong start,” Tagaris wrote.
Need a big two days if @Berniesanders is going to reach that 5 million donation goal – but we’re off to a very strong start. Stay tuned for updates via email & text, but let’s keep it rolling! pic.twitter.com/tzwRvwgR96
— Tim Tagaris (@ttagaris) December 30, 2019
Tagaris was Sanders’ 2016 director of digital advertising and now heads up Aisle 518 Strategies, a political consulting firm for progressive candidates which Sanders paid $3.8 million in the third quarter.
The Sanders campaign told the New York Times Monday it has 4,865,000 donations for the year, and would need an additional 135,000 individual contributions to reach its goal by the end of 2019.
In a message on Facebook, Sanders said the campaign had received more individual contributions than any candidate in history.
“We are taking on the whole damn 1 percent in this campaign. And we will only be successful if we build an unprecedented political movement of millions of people,” Sanders said.
Throughout the year Sanders has touted that his average donation is $18. He has criticized other candidates, including former Vice President Joe Biden and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigeig, for taking large contributions from corporations and holding private fundraisers.
If Sanders’ average donation remains the same throughout the fourth quarter, his campaign will have raised around $87 million for the year — a number likely to be the pacesetter for the rest of the candidates in the Democratic primary.
Sanders raised $180 million in his 2016 presidential bid.
Sanders has been riding a wave of good fortune since the Dec. 19 presidential debate in which he repeatedly attacked Biden and Buttigieg for taking money from billionaires and also criticized the former vice president for supporting free trade and approving the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
On the day of the debate, the Vermont senator received more than $1 million in donations from “tens of thousands” of people — a record fundraising day for the campaign in 2019, according to the Sanders team.
Biden has been badly out fundraised by Sanders and others throughout the election cycle, but he recently decided to embrace the support of political action committees (PACs) as well as beginning to target people who can “bundle” donations for him.
In a move to appear transparent about where his money is coming from, Biden released the names of people who have raised at least $25,000 for his campaign so far.
The list includes Jane and Bill Stetson, who live in Norwich, Vermont, and hosted a private fundraiser for Biden during the first week of November.
The former vice president’s campaign struck an optimistic tone in recent fundraising emails as it is looks to top $22 million for the fourth quarter.
Other candidates have not been so lucky.
Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s campaign admitted Friday Dec. 27, in an email to supporters it is “nearly impossible” for her to match her third quarter numbers, as she falls off Sanders’ fundraising pace and has lost ground to him in the polls.
In the same email, Warren said she has raised slightly more than $17 million, putting her well behind the $24.6 million she brought in during the third quarter.
Like Sanders, Warren has sworn off meeting privately with wealthy donors for her presidential bid, and has relied on small online contributions.