Crazy Joe’s still got it.
In this post yesterday I wrote that the media may be switching its fancy to the new-wave progressive Democrats. That may very well be so, but it would appear that some old Democrat money has been hanging around just waiting for Joe Biden to get in the race:
Top donors who helped power President Barack Obama’s campaigns are getting ready to boost Joe Biden for 2020.
The former vice president, whose fundraising lagged during his previous bids for the White House, would this time enter the race with a base of support from many of his party’s major givers, according to interviews with 20 top Obama fundraisers, who each raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to help elect the former president.
Many of Obama’s backers say deciding which candidate or candidates to support in 2020 is difficult. But Biden, who a number of Obama’s funders count as a friend and former coworker in the administration, comes out of the gate with a crop of top-tier fundraisers ready to back his bid and other donors willing to cut personal checks to jump-start Biden’s campaign,
I call the old money in the GOP the “Harumph!” money and the Democrats’ version of that stepped up for the former vice president in a big way.
Politico reports that Biden’s first day fund raising numbers eclipse those of every other candidate in the race:
Joe Biden’s campaign announced Friday that he raised $6.3 million on his first day as an announced candidate, placing him atop the crowded Democratic primary in terms of first-day fundraising totals and quelling doubts about his ability to raise enough money to compete.
His surprising total — Biden has not been a candidate on his own since 2008 — far exceeded expectations set by those who suggested the establishment-oriented politician couldn’t compete in the new world of Democratic campaigns fueled by small-dollar donors.
People often forget that the establishment donor class in the two major parties became the establishment because they were — and still are — wealthy. Despite the populist posturing of the Democrats, there is a lot of money driving things over on that side of the aisle and Joe Biden has been working that crowd since most of Bernie and Beto donors’ parents were young.
The younger Democratic candidates who have found themselves to be media flavors of the day or week may have believed a lot of their own press and thought that Biden may be past his prime and wouldn’t resonate with the primary voters.
That could yet turn out to be true. However, this zillion-candidate primary season is going to require a lot of money to slog through successfully, and Biden is still a relevant player in the donor game.
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