Beto O’Rourke announced that he raised $6.1 million in the first 24 hours

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CENTER LINE, Michigan — One great question surrounding Beto O’Rourke has been whether he could replicate the massive fundraising totals he mustered in the Texas Senate race last year.

On Monday, O’Rourke put any doubt to rest, announcing that in the first 24 hours of his campaign, he had raised a staggering $6.1 million.

In so doing, the Texas Democrat signaled that he’s in for a sustained campaign— with the fundraising capacity to last deep into the primary and to compete with anyone in the race.

“Six million bucks overnight is impressive and anyone who says otherwise doesn’t understand the game,” said Kirk Wagar, a former top Barack Obama donor who is backing Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.). “It’s not the same as when Jeb Bush did it, where he had everyone lined up when they all donated. This guy, as far as I know, didn’t make a bunch of calls. Didn’t have a bunch of people that were pounding people.“

Standing in front of a strip mall coffee shop in this suburb of Detroit, O’Rourke proclaimed Monday that he was building “the largest grassroots campaign this country has ever seen, funded completely by, powered completely by people, not PACs, not lobbyists, not corporations and not special interests.”

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Perhaps no other candidate’s first 24-hour fundraising total was as closely watched as O’Rourke’s, whose credibility as a national contender largely rested on the small-dollar fundraising list he developed as a Senate candidate. But O’Rourke, despite raising more than $80 million in that campaign, was running against Ted Cruz, a Republican universally loathed by Democrats — a different fundraising proposition than the large field of Democrats with whom he is now competing for money and support.

“He had to raise more than everyone to continue his momentum. He did. Otherwise, they would have said people gave against Ted Cruz, not for Beto,” said Michael O’Neil, a former Midwest finance director for the Obama campaign. “It is clear, donors were excited to invest in Beto.”

O’Rourke’s total crushed the first day hauls of many of his Democratic competitors and surpassed even Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), the fundraising pace-setter and a far better-known candidate who collected $6 million in the first 24 hours of his own campaign. In an email to supporters Monday, the Sanders campaign pointed to O’Rourke’s total and asked to help “close the gap” before the first official Federal Election Commission fundraising deadline.

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