Democratic fundraising falters while tax-exempt voter groups hit record donations
Traditional Democratic fundraising dropped sharply in 2024, but the network of tax-exempt charities that handle voter registration raised a record amount.
In the 2024 election, the Democratic Party’s usual fundraising streams shrank by about 30%, while a sprawling network of tax-exempt nonprofits that conduct voter registration and get-out-the-vote work raised an unprecedented $640 million, according to a Capital Research Center report. The surge was boosted by the All by April campaign, led by Pierre Omidyar’s Democracy Fund, which moved $155 million into these charities early in the year and has already allocated $268 million for the upcoming 2026 midterms.
Despite their legal requirement to remain nonpartisan, several groups have been caught engaging in partisan tactics, such as the Voter Participation Center’s filtered Facebook ads and the Everybody Votes campaign’s fraudulent registrations in Michigan and Pennsylvania. The New Georgia Project faced the largest state ethics fine in Georgia’s history, and the Ohio Organizing Collaborative was raided by the FBI. Investigations also linked Everybody Votes to email discussions involving John Podesta and Swiss billionaire Hansjorg Wyss.
Why it matters
It shows how Democrats are increasingly relying on nonprofit charities for election work, raising questions about transparency and legal compliance.
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