Former US president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump holds a rally ahead of the New Hampshire presidential election in Rochester, New Hampshire, US, January 21, 2024.
Mike Segar | Reuters
Former President Donald Trump last month raped President Joe Biden for the first time in 2024, a possible sign that Trump's trial in New York could give his campaign a fundraising boost.
Biden's political operation announced in a news release Tuesday that the combined campaign, joint fundraising committees and the Democratic National Committee had raised $51 million in April. Trump and the Republican National Committee recently announced they raised $76 million last month.
The exact numbers will be impossible to verify until July, when both Biden and Trump's joint fundraising committees file their quarterly financials with the Federal Election Commission.
The Republican National Committee had its best month of the year so far in April, when it raised about $32 million. The Democratic National Committee, however, slightly outpaced them, booking about $35 million last month.
With the exception of money from the RNC or PACs, Trump'The campaign committee reported raising $9.4 million in April. Biden's campaign committee raised $24.2 million during the same period, according to new FEC filings released late Monday night.
Trump and the RNC's success came the same month that the former president took part in a massive fundraiser at Wall Street veteran John Paulson's Florida home on behalf of one of his joint fundraising committees, called Trump 47.
According to the Trump campaign and the RNC, the event raised more than $50 million, split between the Trump campaign, the RNC, his Save America political action committee and more than a dozen state parties.
Still, Trump's apparent lead over Biden suggests the former president's effort to try to raise money for his trial in New York could pay off. Trump's first day in court was April 15.
Despite his legal hurdles, a growing number of wealthy donors who backed Trump's two previous runs for the White House have recently returned to his corner.
Trump's campaign raised money during the trial with email messages and receiving what amounted to hours of free media, while cable news channels interrupted a live interview with reporters outside the Manhattan courthouse.
Since April 19, Trump's team has spent more than $300,000 on Facebook ads, with many of the spots focusing on his trial and raising money for his re-election campaign.
The documents also underscored the differences between how the two campaigns are staffed and executed.
U.S. President Joe Biden attends a campaign event at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., April 18, 2024.
Elisabeth Frantz | Reuters
Biden's re-election campaign reported spending about $3 million on payroll costs in April, with more than 250 employees on its books, according to a Political analysis of the raw data of thousands of line items.
Trump's campaign spent just $550,000 on payroll in April and paid about 65 employees.
Biden has already built out networks of local campaign offices in the major battleground states, while Trump has a very small footprint in most of them.
Still, it's not clear how much of a difference having staffers on the ground really makes in modern presidential elections, where voters see candidates all over social media and on national cable news.
For example, during Trump's successful presidential campaign in 2016 experts on both sides of the aisle predicted that his refusal to invest in large networks of paid staffers across the country would derail his bid for the White House.
