When I started my Dem fundraising project for the 2024 cycle, I took a pessimistic view, figuring that between the massive engagement drop on Twitter since Musk took over & other factors, I'd only raise perhaps 2/3 as much as I did in 2020.
📣 A few days ago I did a deep dive into how one of the "SAVE DEMOCRACY!" PACs clogging up your in boxes actually spent the $750,000 they raised last cycle.
Today, as promised, I'm breaking out a 2nd "Help Dems!" PAC spending.
Spoiler: It's even worse.
In my prior analysis I found that "Blue States PAC" only gave around 30% of what they raised to actual Democratic candidates, party committees and/or activist organizations.
In this one I find that "Fight the Right PAC," which raised over $1 MILLION last cycle, only gave...22%.
In both cases, ~1/3 of the total ($237K for "Blue States PAC" & over $310K for "Fight the Right PAC") went to some firm called "Collective Action LLC" out of DC for "Digital Consulting."
For the life of me I can't figure out what the hell "Collective Action LLC" actually does.
Here's what it says on the home page of their website, which also claims several Dem Senators are "Partners" because they gave some money to them last cycle.
"We don’t employ a large staff or throw money at high overhead costs."
Keep it up, we cannot afford to lose the Senate (and yes, I donated).
Via Kyle Griffin:
Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown hauled in more than $12 million in the first quarter of 2024 for his re-election bid — breaking an #Ohio record, according to his campaign.
The only category where I’ve raised less so far is U.S. Senate races, and even then there’s an important detail: Most of the gap is for the LONG SHOT states.
The COMPETITIVE Senate races have raised nearly as much as the had as of the end of March in the 2020 cycle.
This is re. my fundraising only, but what it suggests is that, so far, Dem Senate donors are being wiser about how they allocate their dollars:
They’re giving long shot candidates enough resources to run a strong campaign without going berserk (see Amy McGrath in 2020 & Marcus Flowers in 2022).