Ron DeSantis’s campaign team said they raised $8.2m within 24 hours of the Florida governor announcing his 2024 bid for presidency.
A donor making calls in the room first disclosed that the campaign raised $8.2m, and the figure was confirmed by Bryan Griffin, a spokesperson for Mr DeSantis, reported the New York Times.
The figure is more than the $6.3m that president Joe Biden raised in his first 24 hours as a candidate in 2019. It is also more than the $6.1m raised by former representative Beto O’Rourke that same year.
It is roughly double the $4m that Donald Trump’s campaign said it had raised in the 24 hours after his criminal indictment earlier this year.
The donor gathering kicked off on Wednesday as participants began “dialing for dollars” and received swag that included baseball hats, pens, and stress squeeze balls, according to the Business Insider. Mr DeSantis’s supporters had gathered at the Four Seasons in the Brickell financial district of Miami to raise cash for the 2024 campaign, the report stated.
Mr Griffin told the outlet that the campaign was raising both primary and general election funds. The campaign can raise $3,300 per donor for both the primary and general election.
He did not specify how the money was earmarked for use only in the general election, should Mr DeSantis become the nominee.
It is also not clear how many donors contributed in the first 24 hours.
Mr DeSantis formally launched his campaign on Wednesday during an online conversation with Twitter CEO Elon Musk.
But the audio stream crashed repeatedly, making it difficult for most users to hear the announcement in real time.
On Thursday, Mr Griffin said that the campaign raised $1m in the first hour after Wednesday’s announcement.
“There was so much enthusiasm for Governor DeSantis’s vision for our Great American Comeback that he literally busted up the internet,” he said in a tweet.
“Washington is next. $1 million raised online in one hour... and counting!”
According to a NYT report, the $8.2m raised by Mr DeSantis outpaced Mr Trump who had raised about $9.5m in the six weeks after he announced his campaign in mid-November.
