Allegations are surfacing that Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign is ending with substantial debt as it closes down. Christopher Cadelago, Politico’s California bureau chief, claimed on X, “Kamala Harris’s campaign ended with at least $20 million in debt, per two sources familiar. Harris raised over $1 billion and had $118 million in the bank as of Oct. 16.”
Kamala Harris's campaign ended with at least $20 million in debt, per two sources familiar. Harris raised over $1 billion and had $118 million in the bank as of Oct. 16.
— Christopher Cadelago (@ccadelago) November 7, 2024
Breitbart’s Matthew Boyle elaborated, painting a grim picture of a financial crisis within the campaign. “Ok so this just got very explosive. A Kamala campaign staffer who saw these posts called me just now and said there is a massive scandal here worthy of an audit,” Boyle posted on X. “The $20 million debt thing is real. Rob Flaherty, this staffer said, is currently shopping around the Kamala fundraising list to anyone who wants it to try to raise the money back. This includes other campaigns and outside groups. Flaherty is the deputy campaign manager and reports to Jen O’Malley Dillon.”
Ok so this just got very explosive. A Kamala campaign staffer who saw these posts called me just now and said there is a massive scandal here worthy of an audit.
— Matthew Boyle (@mboyle1) November 7, 2024
The $20 million debt thing is real. Rob Flaherty, this staffer said, is currently shopping around the Kamala… https://t.co/7EJ9ruKQzs
Boyle also shared that an unnamed Harris campaign adviser suggested that “a billion dollars” went toward “all the concerts” with artists like “Katy Perry, Lizzo, Eminem, Bruce Springsteen.” This allegedly took priority “at the expense of prioritizing and spending money on social media and other campaign priorities.” The source noted that even if the campaign did not pay these artists directly, the production costs were “immense.”
So the Kamala Harris campaign
— Comfortably Smug (@ComfortablySmug) November 7, 2024
Raised a billion dollars
Spent it all on paying celebrities to do concerts
Lost
And is now $20 million in debt and trying to sell their list of supporter emails to pay that off?
Amazing
Boyle further reported that several campaign staff members have not yet received overdue payments promised to them. “IE, they didn’t pay the staff,” he wrote.
Newsweek followed up but was unable to confirm the allegations or get a response from the Harris campaign. The outlet did verify that the Harris campaign raised over $1 billion as of October 16.
In response to the campaign’s loss, Sen. Bernie Sanders attributed the defeat not to spending, but to the wrong message, as he told The New York Times. “It’s not just Kamala,” Sanders said. “It’s a Democratic Party which increasingly has become a party of identity politics, rather than understanding that the vast majority of people in this country are working class. This trend of workers leaving the Democratic Party started with whites, and it has accelerated to Latinos and blacks.”
He added, “Whether or not the Democratic Party has the capability, given who funds it and its dependency on well-paid consultants, whether it has the capability of transforming itself, remains to be seen.”
Democratic Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts echoed Sanders’ sentiment, noting that Democrats need to be more aligned with the concerns of everyday Americans. “Democrats spend way too much time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest about the challenges many Americans face,” Moulton said. “I have two little girls, I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I’m supposed to be afraid to say that.”
