Cory Booker’s campaign said that it raised more than $6 million in the third quarter of 2019, more than a third of which came after the campaign announced an ultimatum that the New Jersey senator would likely drop out of he did not reach a fundraising goal.
Ten days before the Sept. 30 end-of-quarter deadline, Booker’s campaign warned that if he did not raise an additional $1.7 million in the quarter he did not think he would have the resources necessary to compete for the Democratic presidential nomination. “If we’re not able to build the campaign organization, which can raise money that we need to win the nomination, Cory’s not going to continue running and consuming resources that are better used on beating Donald Trump,” Booker campaign manager Addisu Demissie said at the time.
The campaign surpassed the $1.7 million on Sunday and raised nearly $2.2 million during the 10-day push, more than a third of $6 million three-month haul. He has surpassed 165,000 individual donors, one of the requirements for qualification in the November round of Democratic presidential primary debates.
Booker’s July-through-September haul is an improvement over what he raised in the last two periods: about $5 million in the first quarter of the year and around $4.5 million in the second quarter. But while he had progress in fundraising this quarter, Booker’s campaign war chest lags significantly behind other Democratic presidential hopefuls. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ campaign reported raising $25.3 million during the third quarter, and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg said it raised $19.1 million in the three-month time period.
Working off a new principle of “radical transparency” sparked by the make-or-break fundraising push, the campaign provided a glimpse into the campaign’s finances far beyond what others make public. It set a new fundraising goal on Tuesday of $3 million in the month of October but made clear that the goal is not a make-or-break dropout goal like the end-of-quarter push.
“It was never about survival, it was about growth,” Demissie said about the $1.7 million ultimatum in a Tuesday press call.
The campaign projects it will spend $7.2 million in the fourth quarter, with more than $4 million of that covering staff salaries and benefits. It plans to hire 40 new staff members in the next six weeks, open more field offices in early states, and make a “six-figure investment” in building the campaign’s email list so it can attract more supporters and donors.
“Our emphasis all along has been on out-organizing campaigns,” Demissie said.
The campaign has not yet calculated its ending cash-on-hand or total spending during the third quarter.
