Warren raises $21.2 million in fourth quarter of 2019

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) raised more than $21.2 million in the last three months of 2019, her campaign announced on Friday, a total that surpassed a self-imposed $20 million goal for the quarter, but falls short of the fundraising hauls of her top rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Warren raked in nearly 900,000 donations from 443,000 people in the fourth quarter of 2019, with an average donation size of $23, her campaign manager Roger Lau said in an email to supporters. 

Her fourth quarter total was bolstered by more than $1.5 million in donations in the final day of 2019, the best day of fundraising for her campaign to date, Lau said.

The $21.2 million haul is a sizable one for Warren, though it was surpassed by the fundraising totals of her three top rivals in the primary race. Former Vice President Joe Biden announced on Thursday that he had raised $22.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2019, while former South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg raked in $24.7 million.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) eclipsed them all, bringing in more than $34.5 million in the last three months of 2019_  the largest three-month total raised by any candidate in the Democratic presidential field so far.

President Trump outraised all of the Democratic contenders. His campaign announced on Thursday that he had raised roughly $46 million in the last three months of 2019 and closed out the year with $102.7 million on hand.

Warren’s fourth quarter haul also fell short of the nearly $24.7 million she raised in the third quarter of the year, which spanned July through September.

Still, Warren finished the year as one of the primary field’s most formidable fundraisers. She brought in more than $71 million over the course of 2019. And unlike some of her rivals — Biden and Buttigieg, in particular — she has eschewed traditional big-ticket fundraisers that often provide candidates with sizable financial boosts.

“Elizabeth didn’t host any private events to raise money from wealthy donors behind closed doors. She didn’t take any money from Washington lobbyists or PACs,” Lau wrote in the email. “And we still hit our goal. That’s because grassroots donors are building a grassroots movement to change the way campaigns are funded. And that’s a big part of how we’ll change who government works for.”

Warren is vying with Sanders for the progressive lane in the Democratic primary race. But the high premium her campaign has placed on a top finish in Iowa, the first-in-the-nation caucus state, has also put her in direct competition with more moderate candidates, like Buttigieg.

That Warren’s fundraising was eclipsed by her top rivals wasn’t unexpected. In a memo to supporters last week, her campaign acknowledged that its fundraising had slowed in the fourth quarter, and that it had brought in just over $17 million at that point.

Her campaign eventually passed that mark. But Lau said that with 2019 out of the way, the campaign faces even more ambitious fundraising goals.

“We hit our goal for 2019, but it’s 2020 now, and we’ve got new, must-hit daily targets,” he wrote. “Money we raise every day in January will get sent straight into connecting with voters and caucus-goers, and the first votes are just a few weeks away.”