Sunday, January 20, 2008

Edwards Fundraising Goal Falls Short

Edwards' supporters efforts to raise $7 million dollars in one day weren't even close according to Mark Maynard:
I can’t find official numbers, but according to a comment left at Democratic Underground dotcom, the Edward’s “money bomb” fell dismally short of the $7 million dollars that had been hoped for. Apparently, about $1 million was raised. That’s not bad, I suppose, for a really unorganized last-minute effort, with no help at all from the national campaign, but I think we were all hoping for quite a bit more.
I was hoping for better results too, but $1 million is better than nothing. I'm not sure if that total includes matching funds or not. If not, that $1 million becomes $2 million dollars.

The Edwards' campaign was appreciative of our efforts and David Bonior (the national campaign manager) posted a thank you on their website.
Thank you! On behalf of John and Elizabeth Edwards and our entire campaign, I want to thank everyone who made a contribution on Friday, January 18th. In particular, I want to thank all those from the netroots community for rallying to our side at a time when we need it most. Thanks to you, we received several thousand contributions on Friday - and more than half of those contributions were from folks who had never before made a donation to our campaign.

As a result of your support, Friday was one of the best online fundraising days ever for our campaign. And, importantly, the great majority of those contributions will be eligible for matching funds, doubling the impact of your extraordinary effort.

We appreciate every contribution and every contributor to our campaign. We know many of those who have given to this campaign do so because they see that John is fighting for them - for their families and for the American dream we hold close to our hearts. Thank you for continuing to stand with John, and for helping to get out his message of bold, transformational change.
We fell short of our goal, but we still have South Carolina and Super Tuesday to look forward to. If Edwards secures enough delegate votes in those contests, pundits are saying it could make him a kingmaker. His aides haven't divulged what he might want for the support of his delegates, but he'd certainly be able to wrangle a prominent role for himself in a Democratic administration. That gives me some consolation.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's sad to see Edwards' campaign crash and burn like this. What do people see in Clinton and Obama that they don't in Edwards.

Of the three, Edwards has the best health care plan with at least a possible path to single-payer. He's used the boldest language for getting out of Iraq completely. And his strong positions and history on standing up to corporations should resonate with every poor, working class, and middle class person in America.

I don't get it. I don't get it...

Lew Scannon said...

The main problem is the media, which has focused almost exclusively on Clinton and Obama from the beginning, ignoring Kucinich and marginalizing Edwards. Since most people get their opinions from 30 second sound bites on the national news, it's no wonder better candidates are being ignored.

Kathy said...

Abi, you summed that up better than I ever could. You should be writing my posts for me!

Lew, you're right. The media pushes Obama and Clinton because they think it will make for better press. First woman president, first black president, racial tensions between the two, etc., etc.