Obama, DNC Pull In $86 Million In Last Fundraising Quarter

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The latest fundraising numbers from President Obama’s reelection effort are jaw-dropping and represent the kind of haul Republicans have been warning their supporters about for months.

In a video sent to reporters and supporters Wednesday morning, Obama campaign manager Jim Messina announced $86 million in total fundraising between April and June of this year. Messina said $47 million went to the Obama campaign itself, while $38 million went to the DNC.

The combined goal was $60 million. In the end, Obama’s fundraising forces burst through that goal by more than $20 million, which is more than Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney raised in total.

Republicans have long expected to be outraised and outspent in 2012, but Obama’s haul eclipses even those expectations. The president’s supporters pulled in more than double the entire total raised by all known fundraising by the Republicans running for president, combined.

As Politico notes, “While there are a few Republicans who haven’t shared their numbers, including Michele Bachmann, the group that includes Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, Tim Pawlenty, Jon Huntsman and Newt Gingrich has taken in just $33.1 million.”

More than half a million donors contributed to Democratic efforts to create the combined total, Messina reports in the video. That group gave to Obama more than 680,000 times.

But the small numbers found in Obama’s fundraising announcement are even better than the huge ones (if you’re a supporter of the president’s reelection and not someone running against him, that is.) Messina reports that the average donation was just $69, and 98% of all the money raised came from donations of $250 or less. The average donation number is “a far lower number than the 2008 campaign,” the Hotline notes, “and an indication that the fundraising well is deep.”

“Again, we did this from the bottom up,” Messina says in the video. “We didn’t accept one single dollar from Washington lobbyists, or special interest PACs, a commitment no other presidential campaign has made and which the Republican National Committee also refuses to make.”

While Obama’s numbers are huge, the nature of political spending in the post-Citizens United decision era could make them less important. Messina warns in the video that GOP-leaning outside spending could total as much as $500 million, all of it from undisclosed sources. Obama and the Democrats have their own Citizens United-style anonymous spending groups, though they expect to be outspent by Republican-leaning undisclosed cash.

Watch the video breakdown of Obama’s fundraising totals:

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