Pete Buttigieg's Campaign Says He Raised More Than $19 Million In Third Quarter

Pete Buttigieg’s impressive fundraising streak continues. 

The 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful and South Bend, Indiana, mayor, raised more than $19.1 million in the third quarter, his campaign announced on Tuesday. Buttigieg, the first major gay presidential candidate, has raised a total of more than $51 million since the beginning of the year. 

“People continue to be drawn to Pete and his vision of bridging our divides and to his bold plans to move our country forward, and our campaign has grown exponentially faster than any other candidate in the 2020 field,” Buttigieg’s campaign manager, Mike Schmuhl, said in a statement.

Schmuhl added that about 182,000 new donors contributed to the campaign in the three months that ended Sept. 30, bringing the total number of unique donors to more than 580,000.

Buttigieg’s quarterly fundraising efforts fell short of the staggering $24.9 million that his campaign raised in the second quarter. His Q2 numbers eclipsed those of all his Democratic rivals,  including the $19 million raised by Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and the $21.5 million amassed by former Vice President Joe Biden .

Buttigieg won’t be boasting the top fundraising figures in the third quarter.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) raised $25.3 million in Q3 , the senator’s campaign said on Tuesday. All 2020 presidential candidates will need to report their fundraising totals to the Federal Election Commission by Oct. 15.

“Bernie is proud to be the only candidate running to defeat Donald Trump who is 100 percent funded by grassroots donations – both in the primary and in the general,” Faiz Shakir, Sanders’ campaign manager, said in a statement. “Media elites and professional pundits have tried repeatedly to dismiss this campaign, and yet working-class Americans keep saying loudly and clearly that they want a political revolution.”

The New York Times praised Buttigieg  in July as being the Democratic candidate who had most successfully “married traditional high-dollar fund-raising with online small donations,” wooing a diverse array of contributors who included college students to tech executives in Silicon Valley, as well as military veterans and members of the LGBTQ community. 

“They’ve got a badass operation,” Rufus Gifford, finance director for former President Barack Obama ’s reelection campaign, told the Times of Buttigieg’s campaign.

Buttigieg rakes in around $100,000 every time he appears at a fundraising event, Politico reported.

Buttigieg and his Democratic rivals had been racing to raise more campaign cash ahead of this week’s fundraising deadline.

The stakes were particularly high for candidates who’ve lagged behind in the fundraising department, including New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro .

Booker warned last month that he was considering dropping out  of the race if his team didn’t raise at least $1.7 million for the quarter. Booker told CNN on Monday, however, that his campaign had blown past that goal.