Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ campaign announced Thursday that it has received contributions from over 1 million individual donors, The Hill reports.
Sanders is the first candidate to hit the milestone and no one has ever reached it as fast as he has.
“With one million contributors, this is the only Democratic campaign that has more supporters than Donald Trump,” campaign manager Faiz Shakir said in a statement.
According to Shakir, Sanders’ hitting the 1-million milestone at this point in the primary demonstrates that he has the strongest base on supporters and shows that he is the most electable candidate, with higher chances of beating President Donald Trump in the general election than any other Democrat in the race.
“Our strength is in numbers, and that is why Bernie Sanders is the only candidate who is able to say his campaign will rely only on grassroots funding in both the primary and against Donald Trump. Like all campaigns we are beholden to our donors, and we’re proud to stand with one million working people.”
Nearly all of Sanders’ donors are eligible to donate again, according to the campaign, and the independent Vermont senator has managed to amass more than 2.5 million donations. Furthermore, more than 125,000 donors make recurring monthly contributions, according to the campaign.
Sanders’ allies are also pointing out that the candidate has been attracting donations from key swing counties — counties that voted for Barack Obama in 2012, and then supported Trump over Hillary Clinton in 2016.
As The Hill notes, during his insurgent run in 2016 — when he unsuccessfully challenged former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, as a relatively unknown independent from the state of Vermont — Sanders managed to build a formidable base of loyal supporters, many of whom are evidently still rallying behind him.
This is astonishing.
1 million donors have given to our campaign, faster than any in history. We’ve now received more than 2.5 million contributions.
We are the only campaign with more support than Trump. We will defeat him and build a country that works for all of us. pic.twitter.com/y76kfWACP2
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) September 19, 2019
According to polling, Sanders is — along with the current front-runner, former vice president Joe Biden — the Democrat most likely to beat Trump in 2020.
As previously reported by The Inquisitr , virtually every single general election poll conducted thus far has Sanders beating Trump. Nevertheless, Biden has managed to preserve his lead, largely due to the fact that Democratic voters appear to believe that he is the most “electable” candidate.
Some claim, however, that it is only a matter of time before Biden’s “bubble” bursts. For instance, columnist Alex Shephard recently argued that Biden’s support is “illusory,” predicting that Biden will continue to lose support as the primary process continues, with most of it going to Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
