With six months until the first-in-the-nation GOP presidential primary in Iowa, the long list of Republican 2024 candidates will be increasingly eager to drum up support for their White House bids via donations.
A bigger picture of the financial pull of the GOP 2024 hopefuls emerged this week after the second quarter results of their campaigning fillings were disclosed.
As expected, former President Donald Trump was the bigger puller in terms of donations between April 1 and June 30, with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the biggest rival to Trump in the 2024 primaries, coming second.
Only one other Republican 2024 hopeful, South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, managed to raise more than $5 million in individual contributions, with other potential also-rans also pushing to meet the donation threshold in order to appear in the first GOP presidential primary debate in August.
Below, Newsweek has compared Trump's fundraising compared to the others in the GOP primary field.
Donald Trump
The former president is not only leading the pack in the polls but also in donations for the second quarter. Trump's campaign team said he raised $35 million between April 1 and June 30, with the money split via his official campaign and via his Save America Super Pac.
This figure includes $4 million raised in the 24 hours after Trump was indicted in New York over allegations of falsifying business records. The former president has pleaded not guilty to 34 charges.
The average donation to the former president's campaign is around $34, the Associated Press reported, showing that Trump is able to pull large sums of money at a grassroots level.
Newsweek reached out to Trump's team via email for comment.
Ron DeSantis
The Florida governor was also able to attain a generous $20 million in fundraising in the second quarter but is also seemingly spending it at a fast rate.
Of the $20 million DeSantis has raised for his campaign, $16.9 million of which came from contributions over $200, according to The New York Times—an indication the Florida governor is more dependent on big-dollar contributions than smaller, grassroots donations.
Around $14 million of DeSantis' second quarter fundraising total came from donors who gave the maximum amount, meaning they cannot give any more money directly to his 2024 campaign for the rest of the race, NBC News reported.
The filings also show that DeSantis' campaign spent nearly $8 million, despite only confirming his 2024 bid in late May. DeSantis' campaign is also struggling financially, resulting in around one dozen staffers being let go as cost-cutting measures.
DeSantis' campaign currently has $12 million in the bank, but only $3 million of that can be spent in a general election.
Newsweek reached out to DeSantis' office via email for comment.
Mike Pence
The former vice president under Trump, who announced his 2024 bid in early June, has only raised just over $1.1 million in the second quarter.
Pence's team has not yet confirmed if he has managed to reach the threshold of 40,000 unique donors to qualify for the first GOP primary debate stage in August.
His camp has also only spent around $74,000 so far in his still-early campaigning, according to filings.
Newsweek reached out to Pence's office via email for comment.
Nikki Haley
The former South Carolina governor, who announced her 2024 bid back in February, raised $7.3 million during the second quarter and has raised a total of $15.6 million in total, her team confirmed to Newsweek.
Haley's presidential campaign also had around $6.8 million cash on hand by the end of June.
Tim Scott
The South Carolina senator raised around $6.1 million between April 1 and June 30, his team told Newsweek, which is the third most in terms of individual donations out of the entire GOP primary field.
Vivek Ramaswamy
The entrepreneur is said to have raised $2.7 million in the second quarter, including more than $440,000 of contributions he made himself, CBS News reported.
Chris Christie
The former New Jersey governor, who announced his 2024 bid in mid-June, has raised more than $1.65 million via his official campaign and reportedly has around $1.6 million in the bank as of June 30.
Asa Hutchinson
Another relative newcomer in the confirmed list of 2024 GOP candidates, the former Arkansas governor has raised more than $743,000 via his campaign and his joint fundraising committee.
Hutchinson also said on Friday that he received donations from 3,928 individual contributors between April and June, and since crossed the threshold needed to qualify for the primary debate with a further 2,516 in July.
Doug Burgum
The North Dakota governor raised $11.7 million in the 23 days from June 7—when Burgum declared his candidacy for president—of which around $10 million is of his own personal investment.
Elsewhere, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez raised $945,000 since launching his campaign in mid-June, with other longshot candidates—radio host Larry Elder, former Texas Congressman Will Hurd, and businessman Perry Johnson—raising around $467,000, $273,000, and $61,000, respectively.
