In the 24 hours after Donald Trump became president-elect, people flocked to donate to the ACLU — a national legal organization known for suing the government to block racially biased laws and advocate for free speech.



The group's donation website crashed under a crush of visitors Wednesday morning, ACLU spokesperson Gabriela Melendez told BuzzFeed News.

By Thursday morning, she said, the group reached a record for online donations in that timeframe: $2.4 million from 38,626 contributions.

“The surge was an over 7,000% increase to our donate link,” Melendez said. The group shared internal records indicating the site went down. “It’s hard to say how long it was down for and we’re trying to pull dollars and gift numbers. Our system is extremely overwhelmed with all of the hits we’re getting."

The ACLU hadn’t sent out any fundraising emails until Wednesday night, she said. The group did, however, post a graphic on its homepage featuring a photo of Trump and the words, “We'll see you in court.”