3.3 Million Unemployed Gave ActBlue PAC $1.1 Billion in over 50 Million Contributions during 2022 Election Cycle
ActBlue PAC was conduit of $2.3 billion to 3400 progressive groups and candidates last election cycle
The progressive ActBlue PAC received $2.3 billion in the 2021-2022 election cycle from 91 million contributions made by 6.8 million people, which was mostly passed through as “earmarks” in a conduit to nearly 3,400 progressive recipients.
Almost half of the money came from donors who identified as unemployed.
The average ActBlue contributor gave about 13 donations between 11/24/2020 (2020 “Year End” FEC report) through 11/28/2022 (2022 “Post General” FEC report) documented in 15 FEC electronic files. Single contribution amounts ranged from $0.01 to $263,400.
Some ActBlue contributors gave thousands and tens-of-thousands of small contributions, which obfuscates analysis of ActBlue data. The ActBlue reports in 15 .fec electronic files in the 2021-2022 cycle are huge and collectively take over 35 GB of disk space. All FEC electronic files in calendar year 2020 take about 130 GB of space.
This article explores various breakdowns of ActBlue donors with examples and more detail in Excel files:
Recipients of ActBlue contributions. [All 3372]
Contributors giving the largest aggregate donations. [Top 1000]
Contributors giving the largest number of times. [Top 1000]
Employers of contributors. [Top 1000]
Occupations of contributors. [Top 1000]
Earmark Recipients of ActBlue Contributions
ActBlue averaged receiving a staggering $3.2 million for each of the 735 days in the election cycle.
Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock led ActBlue recipients since he had two US Senate contests in the election cycle that started after the Nov. 2020 general election. Warnock faced a runoff election in Jan. 2021 and a regular contest in Nov. 2022. In those two contests Warnock received $185 million via ActBlue “earmarks” from nearly 2 million contributors making 5.1 million contributions. Warnock received on average about $250K per day from ActBlue.
See the complete list of 3372 ActBlue earmark recipients in the following Excel file:
Largest ActBlue Contributors
Largest by Total Amount Contributed
The largest aggregate contribution to ActBlue was from Karla Jurvetson, who made 457 contributions to ActBlue that totaled $2.3 million. This money was sent to 320 progressive groups.
Jurvetson identified as a self-employed physician in ActBlue records. Influence Watch says Jurvetson is a “physician, philanthropist, and a large-sum donor to Democratic candidates and PACs.”
Some of the variety of spellings of employer names were standardized above. These standardized employer names are prefixed with an asterisk in employer reports. [See Technical Analysis for details.]
Five of the 15 largest ActBlue contributors above reported no employer.
See list of the top 1000 contributors to ActBlue in the following Excel file:
Largest by Number of Contributions
Small dollar contributors are welcomed by ActBlue, but it’s unclear how some small dollar contributors can afford thousands or tens-of-thousands of donations.
The table below shows a list of 17 contributors, who gave 9,000 or more separate contributions to ActBlue. Thirteen of these identified as not employed.
A recent article by the Gateway Pundit labeled such unemployed donors as “campaign finance mules” or simply “money mules.”
See list of the top 1000 individuals making the largest number of contributions (1953 to 27,588) to ActBlue in this Excel file:
Employers of ActBlue Contributors
ActBlue FEC reports identify the employers and occupations of contributors.
ActBlue’s privacy policy explains:
Campaign finance law requires that we send your name, address, occupation, and employer information along with details of your donation to the recipient of your contribution and report this information in our reports to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) or the relevant respective state agency.
In the last election cycle ActBlue reported 53.3 million contributions from 3.4 million people who identified as “Not Employed” for an employer. The total of these contributions was a staggering $1.16 billion!
This $1.16 billion was shared by 3076 progressive recipients.
Google appears as the largest named employer of ActBlue contributors followed by Microsoft.
See list of the top 1000 employers where employees contributed to ActBlue in this Excel file:
Occupations of ActBlue Contributors
Separately from employer, ActBlue contributors are required to identity their occupation.
In the last election cycle ActBlue reported 51.2 million contributions from 3.3 million people who identified as “Not Employed” for an occupation. The total of these contributions was a staggering $1.13 billion!
This $1.13 billion was shared by 3057 progressive recipients.
Attorneys appear as the largest occupation category of ActBlue contributors followed by “retired” and physicians.
See list of the top 1000 occupations contributing to ActBlue in this Excel file:
Limitations
FEC data is fairly “dirty.” For example, the same name can be reported multiple times with different spellings or addresses. There is not sufficient information to reconcile these differences and report more accurate aggregations.
Related
“Campaign Finance Mules” Identified in Georgia Senate Race – Democrat Raphael Warnock Received Over $24 Million from Hundreds of UNEMPLOYED Donors Giving Over 358,000 Donations, Joe Hoft, Gateway Pundit, Dec. 2, 2022.
ActBlue: Are contributions made through ActBlue PAC contributions? (Hint: No!)
Under the law, contributions made through ActBlue are not considered PAC donations. While ActBlue is organized as a political committee, we act as a conduit for individual contributions made through our platform — we do not make contributions ourselves. We process and send grassroots donations to the campaigns and organizations that use our fundraising platform.
ActBlue collects a fee for their “conduit” service:
We want as many campaigns and organizations on the left to be able to use our grassroots fundraising tools as possible, which is why there is no cost for groups to use our tools (we’re a nonprofit!). We pass along a 3.95% processing fee on contributions to the groups using our platform. ActBlue does not make money off of donations. Completing a contribution involves costs related to processing your credit card. We’re legally required to pass along processing costs to the campaign so that we do not make in-kind contributions to them.
Fundraisers Be Warned: They’re Coming For Your Small-Dollar Donations, Nick Daggers, Campaign & Elections, Nov. 24, 2020.
What’s actually going on is Democratic donors have organized and been inspired to give money. ActBlue has been one of the most powerful tools for fundraising on the Democratic side of the aisle and helped hundreds of campaigns nationwide. ActBlue lets individuals set up tandem pages which allow donors to split one contribution between multiple candidates. These tandem pages are all individual-donor driven. …
There’s no grand conspiracy or an army of robo-donors chipping in $1.04 at a time. In reality, it’s just an organized effort by individuals who genuinely care about our country and want to support Democratic and progressive candidates.