The DCCC passed the milestone early Tuesday morning, 10 weeks before the polls open on Election Day. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi is pictured above. | Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo DCCC surpasses online fundraising total from 2016

The DCCC has bested its total digital fundraising mark from the 2016 election cycle, passing $75.27 million raised with months still to go in the 2018 midterms.

The committee passed the milestone early Tuesday morning, 10 weeks before the polls open on Election Day, a DCCC aide said. It is possible the DCCC could pass $100 million raised online by Nov. 6, since online giving rates grow so rapidly in the final weeks of an election.


Overall, the DCCC's online take accounted for 37 percent of its total fundraising ($191 million) from January 2017 through July 2018. The NRCC raised $144.6 million in the same time period.

Some of the seeds for the online record were planted just after the 2016 election, when House Democrats hoped to capture the majority in an anti-Trump wave but instead netted six seats as President Donald Trump was elected.

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Starting the week after the disappointing result, the DCCC began a digital ad campaign to build its email list, ultimately spending nearly $2.6 million on the effort by the end of March 2017, according to the DCCC aide. The drive came as grassroots Democrats mobilized in force against the Trump administration, flooding existing and new organizations with donations. The people who joined the DCCC list in that acquisition spree have donated nearly $9.5 million to the committee so far.

"While Republicans are reliant on an unprecedented amount of dark outside money, we're proud to be fueled by online contributions from every part of the country," said Julia Ager, the DCCC's chief digital officer.

The Democrats' Trump-era digital bonanza is also boosting their battleground House campaigns. Fifteen candidates running in GOP-held districts raised at least $250,000 online in July, according to a POLITICO analysis of FEC data, while another 17 raised between $150,000 and $250,000 during that time.

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