Kamala Harris raises $200 million in first week of campaign

Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign raised $200 million in its first week as she has emerged as the front-runner to be the Democratic nominee, according to her campaign.

During her first day as the party’s top candidate, after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed her, Harris brought in $100 million, her campaign announced in a press release. Harris’s $200 million haul comes just about 100 days before Election Day.

“The momentum and energy for Vice President Harris is real – and so are the fundamentals of this race: this election will be very close and decided by a small number of voters in just a few states,” Harris for President communications director Michael Tyler said in a statement.

According to the campaign, 66% of donations came from first-time donors. Harris’s campaign also recruited 170,000 new volunteers in the past week and has plans to host 2,300 events in efforts to mobilize grassroots supporters this weekend.

Harris attended a fundraiser in Massachusetts Saturday, and expected to bring in $1.4 million for the campaign from that fundraiser, according to the Washington Post.

In a race against former President Donald Trump, a CNN/SSRS poll released this week showed Trump up 49% to Harris’s 46%, but that represents a tie as both those figures are within the poll’s margin of error. 

In the first week of her candidacy, most of the Democratic party has rallied around her. She has received the endorsement of Democratic leadership in the House and Senate and of former President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama and former President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton.

Her campaign has said she has had enough delegates move from Biden to Harris to secure the party’s nomination ahead of the Democratic National Convention in August.