Watchdogs press presidential candidates to disclose elite campaign fundraisers

Good governance groups urged the 2024 presidential contenders to disclose their top campaign fundraisers, a common bipartisan practice but not a legal requirement.

While individual contributions to federal campaigns are capped at $3,300 each for the primary and general elections, bundlers mobilize their networks to collect hundreds of thousands and sometimes even millions of dollars for candidates. For their efforts, these fundraisers may receive presidential appointments and access. 

“Government accountability depends on transparency in our campaign finance system, and that includes transparency about presidential campaign bundlers. This is why we call on you today to implement a system to regularly and meaningfully release information about your campaign bundlers before Election Day,” the coalition wrote in letters first shared with The Hill to Vice President Harris, former President Trump and independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who suspended his campaign last month but remains on the ballot in certain states.

Campaigns are only legally required to disclose bundlers who are registered federal lobbyists or affiliated PACs to the Federal Election Commission (FEC). The Trump campaign has disclosed one lobbyist bundler as of the end of July, Jeff Miller. The Harris campaign has disclosed two PACs, JStreet PAC and Reproductive Freedom For All PAC, as bundlers.

But these disclosures reveal little about the broader picture of groups and individuals helping both candidates bankroll their campaigns, and neither campaign has disclosed information about their campaign bundlers so far this election cycle.

The Trump campaign — which did not disclose non-lobbyist bundlers during the 2016 or 2020 election — has at least seven bundling tiers, ranging from the  $15,000 “Trump Force” to the million-dollar “Ultra MAGA,” Puck News reported in January.

NBC News reported last September that the four tiers of 2024 campaign bundlers for President Biden’s campaign would receive various “sweeteners” such as invitations to events with the president and Harris, who officially became the Democratic nominee last month.

Democrats and Republicans, including former Presidents George W. Bush and Obama, 2008 GOP presidential nominee John McCain and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, have voluntarily disclosed their top fundraisers, as did the Biden-Harris campaign during the 2020 election cycle.

The coalition encouraged the candidates to continue the tradition, saying, “Implementing a robust bundler disclosure system that publicly displays information about all individuals who raise $50,000 or more for your campaign would help demonstrate your commitment to transparency.”

Thirteen organizations signed onto the letter spearheaded by Issue One, a nonprofit that aims to reduce the influence of money in politics: American Promise, Business for America, Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, Democracy 21, League of Women Voters of the United States, Michigan Campaign Finance Network, National Legal and Policy Center, OpenSecrets, Project On Government Oversight, Public Citizen and RepresentUs.

These groups sent similar letters to presidential candidates in October and January calling on candidates to routinely disclose their bundlers, which neither the three candidates nor Biden, who dropped out of the presidential race in July, have done.

The Harris campaign, Trump campaign and Kennedy campaign did not respond to requests for comment.

Taylor Giorno previously worked for OpenSecrets.