Bernie Sanders and his supporters celebrate his "virtual tie" with Hilary Clinton in the Iowa caucuses on Monday, Feb. 1, 2016.(Photo by Lucian Perkins /for The Washington Post)
Nearly winning Iowa has been very good for Bernie Sanders’s bank account.
An aide to the Democratic presidential hopeful said Tuesday that the campaign had raised $3 million since Monday night’s Iowa caucuses, in which Sanders finished right behind Hillary Clinton, according to Iowa Democratic Party figures.
“It’s been our best day ever,” Sanders communications director Michael Briggs said of the fundraising haul.
[Sanders not ready to concede Iowa or confirm appearance in Thursday night debate]
Sanders raises the vast majority of his money online in small increments, which gives the campaign the ability to return to donors to ask for additional contributions. Only a tiny fraction of Sanders’s contributors have hit the $2,700 maximum, aides say.
He also benefited from new donors in the hour afters his speech on Monday night. Four in 10 who gave during that stretch had not contributed previously to the campaign, Briggs said.
Advisers had expected that a strong performance Monday would produce a windfall of cash.
With all precincts reporting, the state party said Tuesday morning that Clinton had edged Sanders on the share of delegates awarded, 49.8 percent to 49.6 percent. Clinton’s campaign declared victory even before the final tallies were released.
Sanders, who began the last spring as a fringe candidate, has nearly matched Clinton in fundraising during the two previous quarters. And two days ago, the campaign announced it raised an eye-popping $20 million in January alone. The past 24 hour have exceeded even that pace.