Russ Warner on ActBlue: "Phenomenal"

With less than a week left until the election, it is time to head back to the West Coast and profile Democrat Russ Warner, who is running for Congress in California's Twenty-Sixth District.

Russ Warner and his family have lived in the Twenty-Sixth district for nearly 27 years with his family. He runs Warner International Periodical Services, a magazine distribution company that he started in the 1980s.

Warner is running in part because of a challenge from his son. Warner's son Greg returned from serving in the U.S. Army in Iraq for seventeen months and asked his father to make a difference in Iraq by running for Congress.. He decided to challenge Republican incumbant David Dreier who has been in office since 1980. Warner could be the first real threat to Dreier's seat in almost 30 years.

We feel so lucky to have been a part of Russ Warner's success!

ActBlue Democrats, Here's Russ Warner:

We The People: Dan Seals on ActBlue

We are more than excited to profile one of our top fundraisers, Dan Seals, who has raised nearly 1.5 million dollars on ActBlue since 2005.

Dan Seals is running in Illinois' 10th district, where he is challenging Republican incumbent Mark Kirk for the second time after winning 47 percent of the vote in the 2006 election. Seals, who received a masters degree in International Economics and Japan Studies from Johns Hopkins, and an MBA from the University of Chicago, has raised almost $1 million dollars from nearly 8,000 contributors on ActBlue this election cycle.

With formal endorsements from Barack Obama and U.S. Senator Dick Durbin, fervent support from the DCCC and the Netroots community, and a rating from Time Magazine as one of the top 15 House and Senate Races of 2008, Dan Seals is undoubtedly tough competition for incumbent Mark Kirk in Illinois' 10th district.

ActBlue Democrats, here's Dan Seals:

ActBlue Q3 Stats: The Fundraisers

Third Quarter Stats: July 1 - September 30, 2008

Fundraising pages are by far and away our favorite stat to post about during our quarterly stats report. They speak to the core purposes of ActBlue- transparency, accountability, and empowerment. Creating a fundraising page allows any individual to take personal ownership in raising money for a candidate or slate of candidates. ActBlue has tools that help you to create your own personal page or reach out to your existing email contacts, and goal based tools to give you visible fundraising targets. We hope you'll take some time to set up a page and become a successful fundraiser yourself like any of those below.

Here are some links to articles on how to create an Event Page on ActBlue to manage large or small fundraisers, how one candidate creatively mobilized and energized his supporters, and, of course, how to start fundraising on ActBlue. Now on to the stats!

Top 10 Fundraising Pages by Dollars for Q2 2008

FUNDRAISING PAGE	TOTAL CONTRIB.
1.orangetoblue	$630,532.58
2.ricknoriega	$239,713.76
3.accountabilitynow	$161,296.88
4.heinrich	$151,471.25
5.warner	$142,405.08
6.rangelsvictoryfund	$130,950.00
7.khagan	$114,814.93
8.schauerforcongress	$112,815.00
9.dansealsforcongress.com	$110,975.55
10.gavinnewsom	$104,886.64

Did you know that in Q2 only 4 of the top 10 fundraising pages by total dollars had over $100,000 raised through them? In Q3, all 10 of the Top 10 pages raised over $100,000 each.

Top 10 Fundraising Pages by Donors for Q2 2008

FUNDRAISING PAGE	DONORS
1.orangetoblue	6800
2.ricknoriega	2547
3.accountabilitynow	2417
4.blueamericacontest	1901
5.contest	1824
6.heinrich	863
7.barbara4jeanneandkay	789
8.havedarcysback	760
9.boxer4musgrove	638
10.scottkleebforsenate	621

There are some really outstanding candidates and more importantly fundraising pages in these lists. They include a successful event page, efforts by national bloggers to raise a short burst of funds for an Accountability PAC, and efforts by bloggers to get the back of one of their longtime supported candidates Darcy Burner. In addition, Sen. Barbara Boxer has continued to make effective use of ActBlue pages to raise funds for other candidates via her PAC for a Change.

Also this quarter, the Blue America coalition of bloggers, held two separate fundraising contests for their endorsed House and Senate candidates. By working with campaigns, state blogospheres, and their own online communitities, they successfully generated over 3,000 additional contributions for their previously endorsed candidates as each campaign tried to gain the most new donors to these specific fundraising pages in order to received an addtional $5000 check from the Blue America PAC. Contests like this could be a successful model for you to try!

ActBlue Q3 Stats: The Candidates

Third Quarter Stats: July 1 - September 30, 2008

In the last post we showed you the big picture- big totals for dollars and donors. In this post, we'll focus on the people who are the reason for your giving through ActBlue- the Democratic candidates and committees that inspire us and will lead the country at the federal and state level because of your support.

Check below to see the Top 10 Candidates by Dollars and the Top 10 Candidates by Donors for the third quarter of 2008.

Top 10 Candidates by Contributions for Q3 2008

CANDIDATE	RACE	TOTAL CONTRIB.
1. Kay Hagan	NC-Sen	$778,573.20
2. Rick Noriega	TX-Sen	$435,827.78
3. Barack Obama	President	$424,300.38
4. Mark Warner	VA-Sen	$280,859.45
5. Darcy Burner	WA-08	$267,614.18
6. Equality for All	CA-Prop 8	$263,247.68
7. Joseph Sestak Jr.	PA-07	$231,111.29
8. Gary Peters	MI-09	$230,140.86
9. Scott Kleeb	NE-Sen	$220,603.07
10. Martin Heinrich	NM-01	$200,775.79

Many of these candidates are veterans of ActBlue (and some, military veterans, too). Eight of the Top 10 candidates from Q2 have returned to the list in Q3. Newcomers include Darcy Burner and the No on Proposition 8 ballot initiative, the first time we've seen a ballot committee join this list. It's also a reminder that ActBlue is not just for candidates, but make fundraising easy for other organizations including PACs as well as State and County Parties.

Let's take a look at the Top 10 candidates this quarter by donors.

Top 10 Candidates by Donors for Q3 2008 

CANDIDATE	RACE	TOTAL DONORS
1. Rick Noriega	TX-Sen	6612
2. Darcy Burner	WA-08	6406
3. Kay Hagen	NC-Sen	5584
4. Barack Obama	President	4560
5. Al Franken	MN-Sen	4103
6. Scott Kleeb	NE-Sen	2988
7. Andrew Rice	OK-Sen	2796
8. Campaign for our Country	PAC	2554
9. Accountability Now	PAC	2484
10. Annette Taddeo	FL-18	2441

While many of the same candidates appear in this list as well, there are also some fresh faces! Senate nominees from Minnesota and Oklahoma, two different grassroots PACs, plus Annette Taddeo of Florida making an entrance into the Top 10 lists. Last quarter, only two candidates had over 2,500 donors on ActBlue (Rick Noriega and Scott Kleeb). This time, eight of the top ten have over 2,500 donors and the top three all have over 5,000 donors each for the quarter!

There are so many more candidates beyond the Top 10, though. In fact, in Q3, ActBlue distributed checks for funds raised by 1622 candidates- the most ever in one quarter! That includes candidates, local parties, and grassroots entities across the country. While the Top 10 lists give us a picture of campaigns with a broad base of support, there are tens of thousands of other donors making an impact in 1612 other races across the country.

Our next post will look at the impact that you can have on these Democratic races by taking the next step beyond donating and that's looking at our ActBlue fundraising pages!

ActBlue Q3 Stats: The Totals

Third Quarter Stats: July 1-September 30, 2008

This is the last "quarter" for federal campaigns in terms of being a full three months of the year. But that hardly means things are winding down- on the contrary, it was ActBlue second $10 Million+ quarter!

TOTAL CONTRIBUTIONS
Q1 2008 (Jan.1-Mar.31, 2008	$7,091,127.39
Q2 2008 (Apr. 1-June 30, 2008)	$13,674,897.81
Q3 2008 (Jul. 1-Sept 30, 2008)	$12,488,594.79
Lifetime through Sept 30, 2008	$67,556,456.27

The last quarter represents nearly 1/5th of all funds raised by Democrats on ActBlue since our inception. But as this election cycle has proven, the bigger story is not in the total number of dollars raised, but in the total number of donors who have given. As you can see in the chart below, these totals have grown tremendously quarter to quarter this year.

       

TOTAL DONORS
Q1 2008 (Jan.1-Mar.31, 2008)	54,918
Q2 2008 (Apr. 1-June 30, 2008)	65,089
Q3 2008 (Jul. 1-Sept 30, 2008)	135,086

And how does that compare to past history? Look no further than this final table.

Year    Amount Raised    Donors    Avg Donation
            
2004    $862,698.36            26406    $32.67
2005    $1,684,797.22         23816    $70.74
2006    $15,102,597.73     282566    $53.45
2007    $16,872,127.06     169287    $99.67
2008*   $38,578,024.31     393024    $98.16

*through September 30th

Even with the growth in the dollar and donor base in 2008, the average contribution size is still less than $100 per donation, even down slightly from 2007. This is the power of small donors collectively making an impact to fund Democratic candidates across the country.

Speaking of those candidates- that's the subject of our next Q3 stats post!

And on to Texas: Rick Noriega

We started this series in Texas, and 23 days out from the election, we figured it was about time we returned.

Running in one of this year's hottest races, ActBlue Democrat Rick Noriega is challenging Republican incumbent John Cornyn for the Texas Senate seat. Noriega, who has served in both the armed forces and in public office, has been a forceful presence on ActBlue, raising more than $1.5 million from more than eighteen thousand supporters.

Rick Noriega has served with the Army in Afghanistan, among others. After his tour, the two-term Texas state representative and Lieutenant Colonel was appointed Incident Commander of Hurricane Katrina relief efforts in Houston, Texas. During the summer of 2007, Rick was drafted by activists, both online and offline, to run for U.S. Senate.

ActBlue Democrats, here's Rick Noriega:

You've seen the polls, and you've seen the debates, and you know that winning in November is going to take every effort from every one of us. Go to www.actblue.com today and do your part for the candidates you believe in.