The Rev.\u00a0Ed Stafford\u00a0first donated to\u00a0Josh Shapiro\u00a0in\u00a0August 2024, sending the\u00a0Pennsylvania\u00a0governor $10 through the Democratic fundraising platform\u00a0ActBlue. A few weeks later, he gave him $5. And then he made two more $5 contributions on the same day toward the end of the month.<\/p>\n
He would go on to make 105 separate contributions to Shapiro between that August day two years ago and early June, an average of one donation every 16 days.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been getting a lot of text solicitations, and his (Shapiro\u2019s) have come by rapidly and frequently, and that\u2019s how I got to get to know him,\u201d said Stafford, a priest at the Diocese of Youngstown, Ohio. He was particularly impressed with Shapiro\u2019s handling as attorney general of the Catholic Church child sex abuse scandal in the state.<\/p>\n
Stafford\u2019s donations, totaling just under $1,200 over the last two years, form a microscopic share of the $60 million Shapiro has raised since the current fundraising cycle began in 2023. But smaller, repeat contributions from dedicated donors like him are one piece of a strategy \u2014 along with eye-popping checks from wealthy donors and a nationalized fundraising network \u2014 that has allowed the governor to shatter state fundraising records as he looks beyond this November\u2019s race to a prospective presidential run in 2028.<\/p>\n
Blowing past prior candidates<\/p>\n
Between the start of 2023 and\u00a0June 8, Shapiro raised more than $60 million, 56% more than the $39 million he raised at this point four years ago when adjusted for inflation.<\/p>\n
That figure is nearly double that of the second-best fundraiser: former Democratic Gov.\u00a0Tom Wolf, who had raised an inflation-adjusted $31 million at this point in his successful 2018 reelection campaign.<\/p>\n
Shapiro raised the eye-popping amount from roughly 22,000 unique individuals, about 44% more than the 16,000 who had given to his campaign at this point last cycle. That is more than triple the number of donors for the closest comparison, former Republican Gov.\u00a0Tom Corbett\u00a0in 2014, who had only about 6,000 donors at this point in his unsuccessful reelection campaign.<\/p>\n
That figure does not include contributions from donors who gave $50 or less in a campaign finance reporting period, as campaigns are not required to disclose information on those individuals. When including that group, Shapiro\u2019s campaign said it has more than 120,000 unique contributors but declined to comment on the rest of this article.<\/p>\n
Perhaps most staggering, Shapiro\u2019s current campaign has raised nearly one in every five dollars collected by every major party gubernatorial candidate since the 2010 cycle.<\/p>\n
Robin Kolodny, a political science professor at Temple University, said Shapiro is benefiting from a strong personal brand, a weak GOP opponent in state Treasurer Stacy Garrity, and a favorable national environment with an unpopular president of the opposing party dragging down GOP candidates across the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is what happens when you have a highly popular incumbent running for reelection,\u201d Kolodny said.<\/p>\n
Differing motivations for large and small donors<\/p>\n
Shapiro has raised about $2.5 million from donors who have given $50 or less in any given campaign finance reporting period \u2014 more than any prior candidate since 2010. That is about 4.3% of his total fundraising. Garrity has raised about $530,000 \u2014 9.6% of her funds \u2014 from such small donors.<\/p>\n
Among candidates who raised at least $1 million, Shapiro\u2019s percentage is relatively high. Only Garrity; Shapiro\u2019s 2022 opponent, state Sen. Doug Mastriano; and 2010 GOP candidate for governor Samuel Rohrer raised a higher share from small-dollar donors. Shapiro\u2019s 2026 run is also pulling in a slightly smaller percentage of small-dollar givers than his 2022 campaign.<\/p>\n
Kolodny suggested that improvements in technology have likely aided Shapiro\u2019s hunt for smaller-dollar donors.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s so much easier to reach somebody on their phone with an Instagram post or whatever and get them to Venmo me 10 bucks, while it was definitely more steps in earlier elections,\u201d Kolodny said.<\/p>\n
Stafford, whose most common contribution was for $10, agreed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey make it real fast and easy to donate,\u201d Stafford said of the multiple daily text messages he gets from ActBlue. \u201cYou gotta watch (that) you\u2019re not pressing the button too quickly if you don\u2019t want to let go of all your money,\u201d he added with a laugh.<\/p>\n
Dan Mallinson, an associate professor of public policy and administration at\u00a0Pennsylvania State University\u2019s\u00a0Harrisburg\u00a0campus, suggested an additional factor: National politics has filtered down to state politics in ways it had not in the past.<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania voters \u201cdon\u2019t have a presidential candidate on this ballot to express support or anger (about),\u201d Mallinson said. \u201cSo that gets translated into these other races, and Shapiro\u2019s is obviously the most high-profile.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the flip side, Shapiro has raised more than $33 million from donors who have given $100,000 or more in aggregate. That figure is vastly greater than any prior candidate for the office since 2010 and accounts for about 58% of his total funds raised. Garrity, by contrast, has raised about 21.3% of her money from such mega donors.<\/p>\n
Kolodny said big donors\u2019 motivations can differ from those of more modest givers.<\/p>\n
For some donors, it\u2019s practical: They want access to the halls of power in case their business interests intersect with government policy \u2014 regardless of the party in charge.<\/p>\n
With such donors likely viewing Shapiro\u2019s reelection as a sure thing, Kolodny suggested their money has one place to go.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no reason for a lot of these donors to even think, \u2018Well, just in case, I should give some money to Garrity,\u2019\u201d Kolodny said. \u201cThere\u2019s only one horse to bet on.\u201d<\/p>\n
For other donors, it\u2019s ideological: They share Shapiro\u2019s moderate views and want to demonstrate their support.<\/p>\n
A national fundraising network<\/p>\n
More than two-thirds of Shapiro\u2019s money has come from donors who live outside\u00a0Pennsylvania. That figure is vastly higher than any prior candidate for governor since 2010. Only 6.4% of Garrity\u2019s money has come from outside the state.<\/p>\n
Mallinson pointed out that Shapiro finds himself in a unique position among the state\u2019s recent crop of gubernatorial candidates.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the first time Pennsylvania\u2019s really had a governor who\u2019s attracting the national attention that Shapiro\u2019s gotten,\u201d Mallinson said, referring to the widespread expectation that he\u2019ll run for president in 2028. \u201cSo if we\u2019re comparing across governors, it makes sense he\u2019d be attracting more outside money.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the $33 million Shapiro\u2019s raised from donors who have given at least $100,000 or more over the course of the campaign, nearly 70% has come from outside\u00a0Pennsylvania, with\u00a0California\u00a0accounting for about 29% of the money and\u00a0New York\u00a0accounting for a little over 18%.<\/p>\n
Here, too, changes in media and technology likely play a role.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt an earlier point in time, we didn\u2019t have that much information about people representing other areas that shared a characteristic or a position similar to me as the donor, but now, this is easy information to find,\u201d Kolodny said.<\/p>\n
Shapiro, for example, has repeatedly emphasized the impact his Jewish faith has had on his political values and how those values are shared among adherents of many religions. That sort of openness about his identity can be appealing to donors of all faiths.<\/p>\n
As he learned more about the governor, Stafford, a devotee of Catholic social teaching, came to believe the two men shared similar values.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a good, just man \u2014 a good, holy man \u2014 set on serving people, especially people who\u2019ve been hurt and victimized, and those are the kind of leaders we need more than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Rev.\u00a0Ed Stafford\u00a0first donated to\u00a0Josh Shapiro\u00a0in\u00a0August 2024, sending the\u00a0Pennsylvania\u00a0governor $10 through the Democratic fundraising platform\u00a0ActBlue. A few weeks…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252712,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[182,139,28,30,29,50,729],"class_list":["post-252711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-politics","tag-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252711"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252711\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}