The Continuing Mystery of the Harris Campaign’s Runaway Spending and Unpaid Debts

By Jim Geraghty

Sunday, December 01, 2024

 

Did the Harris presidential campaign end with $20 million in debt or not?

 

Back on November 12, NewsNation, among other outlets, reported that “the Kamala Harris campaign is now $20 million in debt.”

 

The following day, Axios reported that Democratic National Committee leaders feared getting stuck with the bill, warning, “debt beyond a few million bucks could hamper the Democratic National Committee’s efforts to rebuild the party over the next four years.”

 

Then on November 18, the Harris campaign’s chief financial officer issued an adamant statement to the New York Times insisting that the campaign did not end with any debt.

 

Patrick Stauffer, the campaign’s chief financial officer, said in a statement that there had been no outstanding debts or overdue bills as of Election Day. He said that “there will be no debt” on the next Democratic National Committee and Harris for President campaign filings in December.

 

Donations made after the election to the “Harris Fight Fund” are being funneled to the Democratic National Committee, officials said.

 

Now Politico reports that Harris’s fundraising emails keep coming, two or three times per day — approaching one month since the election! — because “Harris’ operation ended with around $20 million in debt, according to two people familiar with her campaign finances and granted anonymity to speak freely.”

 

But the same article also reports, “the Harris campaign denies that the campaign or affiliated joint fundraising committees had outstanding debts on Election Day, and says they won’t report debts owed in future Federal Election Commission reports due in December.”

 

Someone is lying.

 

First, if you were an unpaid volunteer for the Harris campaign or any affiliated progressive group . . . wow, did you get screwed. Some big shots were lining up their own version of “generational wealth” from this campaign and you gave the Harris team your own hard work for nothing. What a sucker you were!

 

Second, every Democratic donor should be as irate as James Carville and call for an audit of the campaign and every affiliated group. When you throw in all the money raised by the Biden campaign before Harris took over, the combined Democratic presidential campaigns — not counting super PACs or separate like-minded groups — raised more than $2.15 billion*. How could they possibly have unpaid debts at the end of the campaign? (Remember, the Biden campaign raised and spent a bit more than $1 billion in the 2020 cycle.)

 

Where did all the money go?

 

The Politico article also features this hilarious excuse: “A Harris campaign official emphasized that the campaign is not asking any universe of donors for more than they were giving before the election.” Why would any donor be expected to give more after the race was over? And even if a donor was feeling particularly spendthrift, why would they donate more to a campaign that lost?

 

*This originally said “trillion.” I know, it only felt like the Biden and Harris campaigns spent a trillion.