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Trump raises $34.8M in record fundraising haul after guilty verdict

DOUG MILLS/THE NEW YORK TIMES
                                Former President Donald Trump departs the New York State Supreme Court following a verdict in his criminal trial, in New York, on Thursday. Trump’s campaign announced it had raised $34.8 million after being convicted of multiple felony charges in Manhattan on Thursday.

DOUG MILLS/THE NEW YORK TIMES

Former President Donald Trump departs the New York State Supreme Court following a verdict in his criminal trial, in New York, on Thursday. Trump’s campaign announced it had raised $34.8 million after being convicted of multiple felony charges in Manhattan on Thursday.

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Former President Donald Trump’s campaign announced that he had raised $34.8 million in the wake of his felony conviction, shattering online records for Republicans and an early sign of the extent to which the base was rallying behind him.

The campaign said in a statement that nearly 30% of the donors who gave online were new to the party’s online donating platform, WinRed, giving the former president an invaluable infusion of new contributions to tap in the coming months.

The Trump campaign said the haul was double its previous best day ever on WinRed. And the one-day haul was nearly 10 times the $4 million Trump raised when his mug shot was released in 2023, after his booking in Atlanta for his indictment there.

The figures will not be verifiable until the campaign committees and WinRed make their filings with the Federal Election Commission in the following months.

Cash has been one of President Joe Biden’s advantages so far in the race. His campaign has been advertising in key battleground states since Trump emerged as the Republican nominee while Trump has been absent from the airwaves. The post-conviction money will help Trump close the gap with the Democratic incumbent.

The one-day haul was even greater than the $26 million that the Biden campaign had announced four years ago in the 24 hours after he had named Kamala Harris as his vice presidential pick.

“From just minutes after the sham trial verdict was announced, our digital fundraising system was overwhelmed with support, and despite temporary delays online because of the amount of traffic, President Trump raised $34.8 million dollars from small-dollar donors,” said Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles, two of Trump’s top advisers, in a joint statement. “President Trump and our campaign are immensely grateful from this outpouring of support from patriots across our country.”

In April, Trump’s operation, working in concert with the Republican National Committee, announced that it had raised $76.2 million, beating for the first time what Biden’s shared operations with the Democratic National Committee brought in — $51 million.

The conviction appeared to be driving Democratic donations, as well, though to a much lesser extent.

ActBlue, which processes online contributions for Democrats, registered three of its four biggest hours of donations in all of 2024 on Thursday evening in the wake of the conviction, topping out near $1.3 million in a single hour, according to its online ticker.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

© 2024 The New York Times Company

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