Top Biden Donors Gather Amid Storm Clouds Over Campaign

PHILADELPHIA — Leading donors for Joseph R. Biden Jr. convened this weekend for their first donor retreat since he announced his candidacy and struck a determined posture as Mr. Biden’s campaign found itself under assault from President Trump, losing its clear front-runner status and lapped in the money chase by multiple Democratic rivals, most notably Senator Elizabeth Warren.

Over cocktails on Friday evening and a Saturday spent in a drab hotel conference room, Mr. Biden’s top financiers and fund-raisers received strategy briefings and PowerPoint presentations, and plotted the path forward for the former vice president, who suddenly found himself in fourth place in the money chase.

Only hours before the gathering began, the news broke that Ms. Warren, now seen as Mr. Biden’s chief rival, had out-raised him in the last three months by nearly $10 million — $24.6 million to $15.2 million. He lagged behind Senator Bernie Sanders ($25.3 million) and Mayor Pete Buttigieg ($19.1 million), too.

While some were downbeat about the financial figures, Mr. Biden’s slip in the polls and the onslaught from Mr. Trump, the Biden loyalists described a sense of almost burden and responsibility. If Mr. Biden is to compete financially with the online windfalls of Mr. Sanders and Ms. Warren, several donors said, they believe it would be on the shoulders of the bundlers assembled here.

“All of us realize that Joe Biden does not have the online fund-raising capability of a Warren. Warren has been doing it longer than him. Sanders has been doing it longer than him,” said Dick Harpootlian, a prominent South Carolina supporter who hosted a fund-raiser for Mr. Biden in May.

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Denise Bauer, a former ambassador to Belgium, said there was an urgency in the air. “We need him to get the nomination because he’s the one who can win,” she said, adding “We are all going to try to raise every single dollar we can.”

Some donors played down the importance of the very currency that had brought them to Philadelphia in the first place for what the campaign called a “finance committee forum,” questioning, for instance, whether Mr. Buttigieg and Mr. Sanders had the other political assets needed to seriously challenge Mr. Biden. In a sign of the attendees’ significant financial firepower, Mr. Biden himself addressed the several dozen donors who came to the retreat on Saturday, rallying them for 45 minutes about the months ahead, people there said. The campaign kept Saturday’s session with Mr. Biden behind closed doors, despite pledging to open his fund-raising events to reporters. The campaign said this event with Mr. Biden’s biggest bundlers was different because no money was actually raised.

On Friday afternoon, the donors received a tour of Mr. Biden’s downtown Philadelphia office before decamping to the second floor of The Continental Mid-town, a retro-style bar a few blocks away where they sported shiny “Joe 2020” pins and sipped from an open bar. On Saturday, there were a series of closed-door briefings, with updates from most of Mr. Biden’s top brass, including his campaign manager, Greg Schultz and former chief of staff as vice president Steve Ricchetti, about the run up to the Iowa caucuses through Super Tuesday, including delegate math and digital tactics, according to attendees, who were asked to keep the proceedings private.

Multiple attendees said Ms. Warren was, by far, Mr. Biden’s most discussed opponent, with his strategists telling donors they expected her to come under new press scrutiny now that she has risen in the polls.

Mr. Sanders and Ms. Warren, who refuse to hold traditional fund-raisers or coddle members of the contributor class like those gathered in Philadelphia, have raced ahead of Mr. Biden in fund-raising by attracting hundreds of thousands of small donors online. Ms. Warren had 940,000 donations in the last three months; Mr. Sanders had 1.4 million; Mr. Biden, who sharply cut back digital spending in August, has not disclosed his total number of donations.

Some contributors played down the significance of money in a race flooded by free news media attention, and for a candidate like Mr. Biden whose reputation has been established after more than a decade in the national spotlight.

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“How is money working out for Sanders and Mayor Pete?” asked John Morgan, a lawyer and top Biden fund-raiser in Florida who has hosted the former vice president at his home but who did not attend the summit. “Joe has more than plenty.”Donors were also shown Mr. Biden’s latest ads; the campaign had announced a $6 million television and digital ad purchase on Thursday in the four early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

The summit comes less than four months before the opening Iowa caucuses. And it comes as Mr. Trump has relentlessly attacked Mr. Biden, soliciting the assistance of foreign nations to investigate him, his son Hunter and his business deals, sparking an impeachment inquiry in the House of Representatives.

Donors, many of whom spoke on condition of anonymity, were on edge about how the impeachment proceedings would play out. Would Mr. Trump’s focus on Mr. Biden end up helping him by making it appear that Mr. Trump fears him? Or would Mr. Trump’s barrage — including on the airwaves in early states — and the president’s singular ability to command attention irreparably wound Mr. Biden in the mind of primary voters?

“He’s running a primary campaign and a general at the same time and I think he’s doing a great job,” said Sheila Nix, a former chief of staff to Dr. Jill Biden, who attended the forum. “It’s a little unprecedented having to do both at the same time.”

Biden campaign officials said that they had always expected the primary race to tighten, it was just a matter of who would emerge as their strongest opponent.

Still, the reality began to sink in for the assembled donors: Mr. Biden is likely to be outspent in the coming months. Unlike his two leading rivals, Mr. Biden did not disclose a cash-on-hand total. Mr. Sanders had $33.7 million in the bank. Ms. Warren has $25.7 million.

Mr. Biden is expected to report only a fraction of that. Even if he had spent zero dollars since July 1 — and he has spent millions — his cash on hand would be less than Mr. Sanders or Ms. Warren.

Mr. Biden spent $5 million in both May and June, the most recent months that federal records are available. His staff and campaign costs have only ballooned since then, suggesting he likely spent nearly all, if not more than the $15.2 million he raised in the last three months.

As the race has narrowed to only three candidates polling consistently above single digits — Mr. Biden, Ms. Warren and Mr. Sanders — some see an opportunity for Mr. Biden to consolidate a donor class that is typically more moderate than the grass-roots donors powering the Warren and Sanders campaigns. Mr. Buttigieg and Senators Kamala Harris of California and Cory Booker of New Jersey have been the chief competitors for bundler loyalty.

But Mr. Biden’s uneven performances on the stump and the debates have slowed such movement. During the last debate, a group of Democratic donors gathered for a private event in Manhattan with the strategists James Carville and Paul Begala providing color commentary.

When Mr. Biden went on his discursive and meandering answer that invoked a record-player, there were audible groans, and some people threw their arms in the air in frustration, according to an attendee.

In an interview, Mr. Carville said Mr. Trump’s recent “obsession” with Mr. Biden made the former vice president’s electability case better than anyone else could.

“I think Biden has been given a lifeline here,” Mr. Carville said. “I hope he takes it.”

Among the ads attendees were shown, was a new one from Friday in which Mr. Biden accuses Mr. Trump of trying to “choose the Democratic candidate.”

For all the incoming Mr. Biden has taken — from his rivals, from the White House and from, as the Biden campaign likes to point out, the news media — his advisers believe his continued perch atop many polls proves his resilience,no matter his shrinking lead.

“I always come away from things with him thinking I’ve got to work harder. I need to do more,” Ms. Bauer said. “He doesn’t ask for that. He inspires that.”

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