Source: Politics<\/p>\n
Republicans\u2019 small-dollar donor base has contracted in recent years, leaving the party more dependent on a tiny group of wealthy megadonors for support.<\/p>\n
The GOP has had a cash advantage all year thanks to a relatively small group of large donors who have funded super PACs \u2014 Elon Musk alone has given nearly half a billion dollars<\/a> this cycle. But the campaigns themselves have raised relatively little, and there\u2019s one major reason: Other than President Donald Trump, who is still the party\u2019s biggest fundraiser, Republicans still haven\u2019t figured out how to raise money online.<\/p>\n New campaign finance filings reveal just how deep the problem goes. While Republicans have long struggled to grow their grassroots donor base, they\u2019ve moved in the wrong direction in recent years. The number of federal donors giving through WinRed, the major GOP online fundraising platform, is down, with roughly 1.5 million donors so far this cycle compared to 2.2 million at this time in 2022. Meanwhile the number of donors has increased by about one third on ActBlue, from 4.9 million to roughly 6.6 million.<\/p>\n The contrast is stark: A single Democratic candidate, James Talarico in Texas, has had roughly the same number of donors on ActBlue this cycle as all Republican candidates and committees combined had on WinRed, according to a POLITICO analysis of reports ActBlue and WinRed submitted to the Federal Election Commission.<\/p>\n Republican digital strategists who have been sounding the alarm for years say lagging donations are a product of fatigue, driven by years of urgent messages to the same set of potential donors.<\/p>\n \u201cWe beat the absolute hell out of low-dollar donors with texts and emails without expanding our [donor lists], and now no one pays attention,\u201d said Wesley Donehue, a South Carolina-based GOP digital strategist.<\/p>\n Republicans\u2019 online fundraising struggles have put their House and Senate candidates at a particular disadvantage, as candidates \u2014 unlike super PACs \u2014 face strict contribution limits and need a far larger pool of donors from which to raise money. Poor candidate fundraising has major campaign implications: Democrats\u2019 cash advantage on that front has helped them run nearly as many ads as Republicans<\/a> despite having less money overall, because candidates and parties get better rates than super PACs on broadcast TV.<\/p>\n Democrats\u2019 grassroots fundraising strength is in part because of how decentralized the party is, with individual campaigns and groups building their own donor lists and fundraising operations. Virtually all of the the top Democratic fundraisers online this year are Senate candidates in competitive races.<\/p>\n But Republicans\u2019 online fundraising, like so much of the party, is still centered around Trump and the official party committees. Unlike on the Democratic side, few individual Republicans have managed to break out.<\/p>\n Republicans\u2019 fundraising troubles have left them more reliant on Trump: The president\u2019s super PAC, MAGA Inc., is among the biggest midterm spenders<\/a>. The group and its affiliates have now spent $296 million \u2014 after facing pressure for much of the cycle from some in the GOP who wished it would have gotten involved sooner<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cCandidates are not investing the time and resources in programs that grow the donor lists and attract their supporters into the ecosystem. Instead, they just barrage previous donors with ongoing requests for donation,\u201d said Eric Wilson, a longtime Republican digital strategist and executive director of the Center for Campaign Innovation. \u201cCredit to the Trump team \u2014 they brought new people into the ecosystem, and those people continue to give to them.\u201d<\/p>\n Trump has continued to fundraise since returning to the White House, including through his Never Surrender leadership PAC, which was formed out of his 2024 campaign committee, and two joint fundraising committees from his previous presidential runs.<\/p>\n Of the nearly 1.5 million donors who have given on WinRed this cycle, 324,000 of them \u2014 a bit over 22% \u2014 have given only to Trump\u2019s groups through the platform but not any other candidate or committee, POLITICO\u2019s analysis found. Another 39% of WinRed donors have given to both Trump and another Republican.<\/p>\n Overall, that means about 3 in 5 WinRed donors this cycle have given to Trump, when he is neither on the ballot nor able to run for president again. That\u2019s left non-Trump GOP donors in the clear minority just as the party begins to look for a new standard bearer ahead of 2028.<\/p>\n WinRed isn\u2019t the only online GOP fundraising platform, but it is by far the largest and features all of the major party committees along with prominent House and Senate candidates across the map. Its FEC reports include only federal candidates and committees, not those in state-level races or nonprofits that use the platform.<\/p>\n Republicans once saw their online fundraising disadvantages as a matter of technology. ActBlue, which has been around since the 2000s, gave Democrats a major fundraising advantage in the late 2010s, at a time when Republicans had no similar centralized platform. WinRed, which launched in 2019, aimed to counter that. Now strategists say the GOP\u2019s infrastructure has come a long way, but the party\u2019s tactics still lag behind.<\/p>\n Democratic candidates eyeing higher office often maintain large fundraising operations, which they can use to raise money on behalf of candidates in battleground races while also building their own lists. Among the top 20 ActBlue fundraisers this cycle are former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg\u2019s leadership PAC and Sen. Mark Kelly\u2019s (D-Ariz.) campaign committee. Kelly leveraged GOP attacks on his military service earlier this cycle to boost both his own fundraising and help Democrats across the map<\/a>.<\/p>\n Wilson, the GOP strategist, credited out-of-cycle Democrats for building strong lists that they could use to shore up other candidates. The Republican side, he said, lacks similar coordination.<\/p>\n \u201cAny time a Democrat announces they’re running for reelection, that week every Democrat in the Senate is sending a message to their list raising money for that person,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n About the analysis: Donation totals and number of donors are based on ActBlue and WinRed receipts from all reports this cycle, covering Jan. 1, 2025, through Oct. 14, 2026. Donations that were later refunded are still included. POLITICO\u2019s analysis identifies unique donors based on matching full names and zip codes.<\/p>\n