WASHINGTON _ The Republican National Committee said it brought in a total of $117 million off online fundraising efforts opposing the impeachment of President Donald Trump from late September through Wednesday, gaining 1 million new donors in the process.
The tally only refers to money the RNC, the Trump campaign and a joint fundraising committee said they collectively raised from small-dollar donors through its "Stop the Madness" campaign, which was promoted with TV and digital ads after Speaker Nancy Pelosi's announcement on Sept. 24 that the House would open an impeachment inquiry into the president and ran until his acquittal in the Senate on Feb. 5.
The ads, which appeared online on Google, Facebook, Hulu, YouTube, Instagram, and the Drudge Report, as well as on TV, cost $11.3 million and garnered 460 million impressions, RNC spokesman Rick Gorka told McClatchy.
Gorka added in a statement that the money will allow the GOP to invest more quickly in states Trump lost in the last election but hopes to win in 2020, such as New Mexico, Nevada, Minnesota and New Hampshire.
"With the additional financial support, we are actively looking at additional ways to expand the map beyond our historic field program already in place," Gorka wrote.
"It also is putting Democrats in a tough place," he added in the statement. "The Democrats did not see the money and energy like we did and it is costing them every day."
The Democratic National Committee has not released any data on impeachment-related fundraising, and a spokesman for the DNC declined to comment on the RNC's haul.
In the fourth quarter of 2019, the DNC reported $28 million in donations. That amount is separate from the money raised by Democratic presidential candidates such as Bernie Sanders, who was the top fundraiser in the field. Sanders raised $34.5 million in the fourth quarter.
From October through December, the RNC raised a little more than $72 million, and the Trump campaign brought in $46 million.
In addition to new donors, the RNC also says it collected contact information from nearly 3.5 million people who signed online petitions protesting Trump's impeachment.
Trump had predicted that impeachment would be lucrative for his party.
"I think it's going to be a tremendous boon for the Republicans," he told reporters in December.
