$364.5 million

The bittersweetness of marquee fundraising results

The Biden campaign broke records in August by raising $364.5 million. (To put that in context, Federal campaigns in 2016 spent around $6 billion.)

This is great news for our country and cause for celebration.

But to many insiders, marquee numbers like these land with just a hint of bittersweetness, raising questions like: How can we educate people to give just a bit earlier, when the money is even more effective? How can we better drive funding to the most cost-effective races and tactics?

There’s been tremendous innovation on these fronts in recent years (some of which I’ve been involved with), including Impact Slates, Democracy Donors, One for Democracy, Future Now, Way to Win, Movement Voter Project, The Next 50, GiveSmart, Blueprint, plus several that are under the radar, and probably others I’m forgetting (sorry!). But these have only scratched the surface, and much work remains to be done both before and after November 3rd.