Despite the unprecedented onslaught of negativity from the entertainment industry and mainstream news media outlets, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump hauled in a record breaking $100 million in a single month from individual donors that contributed $200 or less.
Never before has a GOP candidate attained such a fundraising feat in a single campaign stroke.
The number of individuals who contributed to Trump’s campaign amounted to 2.6 million people, which represents a 24 percent increase over the previous month; this is another record breaking number exceeding that of any previous Republican candidate.
In comparison, former GOP candidates John McCain and Mitt Romney in their respective presidential campaigns each raised just under $64 million through individual small donations.
Trump’s fundraising efforts lay claim to other notable occurrences.
On Aug. 31, 2016, the same day that he held a joint press conference in Mexico with President Enrique Peña Nieto and also gave an immigration policy speech in Phoenix, Arizona, Trump raised $5 million in a single day.
Additionally, the Trump campaign vastly exceeded the $5 million mark on Sept. 27, 2016, when the campaign took in $18 million in a single day.
Spearheading these successful fundraising efforts has been Trump’s campaign finance chairman Steve Mnuchin, who happens to be a veteran film producer from, of all places, Hollywood.
Thriving within the left-leaning entertainment community, Mnuchin is the founder of RatPac-Dune Entertainment, a company with a stellar track record in the movie business. Mnuchin's company has produced a significant collection of films, including the “X-Men” movie franchise and “Avatar.”
Mnuchin worked with filmmaker Brett Ratner and finance guru James Packer to produce the films “American Sniper” and “Mad Max: Fury Road.”
RatPac-Dune Entertainment is also connected to the production of the movies “The Devil Wears Prada” and the “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” series.
In May of 2016, Mnuchin was named Finance Chair of the Trump 2016 presidential campaign, taking on the formidable task of heading up the fundraising operations of a first-time political candidate that would end up competing with the Hillary Clinton fundraising machine.
Posing an even greater challenge for Mnuchin is the fact that he has had to seek campaign funds apart from many of the major Republican donors who decided to sit on the sidelines during this race.
Perhaps inspired by the impressive donations from individuals, Peter Thiel, who is the seemingly singular high-profile supporter of the GOP presidential candidate in Silicon Valley’s high-tech community, has made his first donation in support of Trump’s electoral effort.
Through a combination of super PAC donations and funds that will be given directly to the Trump campaign, Thiel will reportedly donate $1.25 million.
The billionaire co-founder of PayPal was a California delegate for Trump at the Republican National Convention and also delivered a speech at the convention in which he said, “Every American has a unique identity. I am proud to be gay. I am proud to be a Republican. But most of all, I am proud to be an American.”
The tech media have questioned why Thiel, up until now, had not donated to the Trump campaign.
Trump’s raising of multi-millions of dollars in small donor donations is reminiscent of the kind of donations of which former Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders often boasted; both candidates’ achievements being truly formidable in scope and substance.
For Trump, the fundraising success raises September to the level of his best campaign finance generating month.
A hopefully motivating note of caution, though, for the Trump campaign: Hillary Clinton, the rival presidential candidate of the same Democratic Party that routinely decries the amounts of cash in political campaigns, has reportedly raised $154 million during the same time period as Trump’s record breaking one.
James Hirsen, J.D., M.A., in media psychology, is a New York Times best-selling author, media analyst, and law professor. Visit Newsmax TV Hollywood. Read more reports from James Hirsen — Click Here Now.
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