Booker campaign warns end is near without fundraising surge

Cory Booker’s presidential campaign is betting it all on the next 10 days, signaling Saturday that it will cease to exist unless it can raise nearly $2 million by the end of the month.

“We have reached a critical moment, and time is running out,” campaign manager Addisu Demissie warned in a memo to Booker staff and supporters. “It’s now or never: The next 10 days will determine whether Cory Booker can stay in this race and compete to win the nomination.”

The bottom line, Demissie said, is that “we do not see a legitimate long-term path forward” if the campaign can’t raise another $1.7 million by Sept. 30, the third-quarter fundraising deadline.

“This isn’t an end-of-quarter stunt or another one of those memos from a campaign trying to spin the press,” he added. “This is a real, unvarnished look under the hood of our operation at a level of transparency unprecedented in modern presidential campaigns.”

Demissie made clear on a conference call with reporters later Saturday that the campaign isn’t out of money or at risk of running out of funds. “That’s the budget” to expand in October and November, he said of the $1.7 million fundraising target. “That’s essentially the number we need to grow our operation both here in headquarters and the early states to credibly compete for the nomination.”

That money would also go toward ballot access, delegate slating and competing in March primaries, he said.

The campaign is framing the memo as unprecedented transparency, but it’s also a strategy to juice lackluster fundraising. The campaign is betting voters, including those who may have Booker second or third on their lists, will respond well to the campaign’s dire warning and get off the sidelines to help him sustain his campaign and continue to have a voice in the primary.

Booker is one of just two African American candidates, both of whom are senators, and the only candidate who lives in a low-income inner-city community. He’s running a campaign to unite a divided nation and heal the wounds of the Trump era. But he has so far struggled to break out of the crowded field, polling around just 3 percent nationally. His campaign, however, is among the best organized, and he has secured key endorsements in the early states.

“National polls mean literally nothing, as you all know,” Demissie told reporters. “The moment that the Iowa caucuses happen on Feb. 3, whatever happens in Iowa is gonna completely shake those up literally overnight. It’s happened historically, and it will happen again this time.”

In the memo, which was first reported by NBC News, Demissie said neither the current campaign coffers nor the fact that Booker is among just 11 candidates who have qualified for the next Democratic debate in October is enough reason to stay in the race.

The qualification thresholds for the November debate are expected to increase, further whittling a field that has seen several candidates drop out in recent weeks.

Demissie predicted the historically diverse field will “narrow dramatically” to just four candidates, excluding the New Jersey senator and “other important voices.” The top four candidates in the race are former Vice President Joe Biden, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, according to a RealClearPolitics average of national polls.

The memo alluded to Biden and Warren’s built-in advantages over Booker, albeit not by name.

“We’ve known since the very beginning that he entered this race with some challenges — he didn’t have the near-100% name recognition of some candidates who’ve been on the national stage before, nor did he enter the race with tens of millions he could transfer from other campaign accounts,” Demissie said, referencing Biden’s name ID and funds Warren transferred into her presidential campaign account.

Demissie called the fundraising target a “herculean challenge” but noted it’s not impossible: The campaign raised $1.4 million in the final 10 days of March.

“I’m quite confident that this strategy will work,” he told reporters. “I believe it will work. I believe there is more support out there for Cory’s voice in this race than one might think, and we’re gonna prove it over the next 10 days.”

By NOLAN D. MCCASKILL

Source: politico.com

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