The president likes to criticise Trump for being too cozy with his fellow billionaires. But Biden’s biggest backers are worth roughly $170 billion—more than triple the collective net worth of Trump’s top tycoons.
Joe Biden’s big cash advantage over Donald Trump is gone. Trump’s main super-PAC, which entered May trailing Biden’s operation by $20 million, made up ground after a New York jury convicted the former president on 34 felony counts. No one donated more than Timothy Mellon, a banking heir who shelled out $50 million the day after the verdict.
But Biden has rich friends, too. Concentrated in Silicon Valley and New York, they have already funneled $77 million to groups backing the president (and, in some cases, his allies). None of the president’s donors are richer, or more generous, than Michael Bloomberg, who has spent more money on federal elections than anyone in American history.
Having given $20 million so far this cycle, the former New York City mayor is already at the top of Biden’s list of donors. Still, his 2024 outlay amounts to less than 2% of the total he spent during the 2020 election, when Bloomberg mounted his own bid for president. The upshot: Biden could leap ahead of Trump in a hurry, if Bloomberg spends even one-tenth of the total he did the last time.
1. Michael Bloomberg
Donations to Biden groups: $20 million | Net worth: $106.2 billion
Bloomberg blew more than $1 billion on his own campaign in 2020, got knocked out, then threw his weight behind Biden, contributing over $100 million to groups that backed him. He donated $19 million to Biden’s main super-PAC at the end of last month. The former mayor of New York City, who got rich selling data-packed machines to virtually everyone on Wall Street, has given billions to charitable organizations. Yet his fortune continues to balloon—Bloomberg entered the exclusive $100 billion club earlier this year.
2. Reid Hoffman
Donations to Biden groups: $17.7 million | Net worth: $2.5 billion
A venture capitalist with Greylock Partners, Hoffman cofounded PayPal with Elon Musk and Peter Thiel before starting LinkedIn, which he sold to Microsoft for $26 billion in 2016. While other members of the “PayPal mafia” have drifted to the right in recent years, Hoffman has become one of the nation’s biggest Democratic donors. He has already poured more than $40 million into left-leaning groups since 2020, with nearly half of that going to groups supporting Biden. “America has the best economy in the world under Biden,” Hoffman said, “and he is running against a convicted felon who has a history of bankrupting businesses.”
3. Jim Simons (deceased)
Donations to Biden groups: $10.2 million | Net worth: $31.4 billion
Simons left his position in Stony Brook University’s math department to start the pioneering quantitative trading firm Renaissance Technologies. He died on May 10 at 86, survived by his wife Marilyn. The couple had been liberal donors for decades, and Jim continued to give major sums in the last months of his life, including a $6.6 million donation to Biden’s super-PAC just a week before he died. Together, the pair have contributed a combined $10.2 million to the reelection effort.
4. Michael Moritz
Donations to Biden groups: $8.3 million | Net worth: $6.2 billion
A native of Wales, Moritz worked in Time magazine’s San Francisco offices in the 1980s, when he sensed something brewing in Silicon Valley and jumped to venture capital. He eventually became a partner at Sequoia Capital, one of the world’s most renowned VC firms. Early investments in companies like Google, Yahoo and PayPal earned Moritz billions. He gave large sums to Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, sat out the 2016 election, then emerged as a major donor in 2020, giving more than $4 million to pro-Biden groups. He’s going big again, giving more via a single contribution in April than he did during the entire 2020 cycle.
5. Stephen Mandel
Donations to Biden groups: $6.8 million | Net worth: $2.5 billion
Mandel, who founded the hedge fund Lone Pine Capital in 1997, cut a $5 million check to Biden’s biggest PAC in 2022. He has also given millions to support the charter school movement, and he sits on the board of directors of Teach for America. Long a dependable Democratic donor, Mandel has gotten more generous in recent years, pitching in $200,000 to support Hillary Clinton in 2016 and nearly $5 million to back Biden in 2020. He’s already up to $5.4 million this round. His wife Susan Mandel has given $1.4 million.
6. Dustin Moskovitz
Donations to Biden groups: $4.2 million | Net worth: $17.8 billion
Moskovitz cofounded Facebook with his Harvard roommate Mark Zuckerberg, which made Moskovitz, for a time, the youngest billionaire in the world. He and his wife have committed to giving away a majority of their $17 billion fortune over their lifetimes. Moskovitz burst into the political scene in 2016, when he gave close to $20 million to left-leaning causes. He spent even more in 2020, giving nearly $50 million to support Biden. Most of Moskovitz’s recent donations to pro-Biden groups took place during the 2022 midterms, so a large chunk of the $4.2 million he’s spent went to help down-ballot Democrats. He may be off to a relatively slow start this cycle, but Moskovitz tends to write big checks in the second half of the year, so don’t be surprised if he starts shelling out soon.
7. Seth Klarman
Donations to Biden groups: $3.6 million | Net worth: $1.3 billion
Klarman cofounded a Boston-based hedge fund named the Baupost Group in 1982. Once a major Republican donor, he doled out thousands to support George W. Bush, John McCain, and Mitt Romney, though he always sprinkled small amounts of cash to Democrats as well. Klarman shifted allegiances after Trump took over the party. In 2016, the hedge-fund tycoon contributed $100,000 to a pro-Clinton group while continuing to support Republicans in House and Senate races. Since then, he has donated more to Democrats, giving millions to support Biden and down-ballot liberals in 2020. Klarman has already given $3.6 million to Biden groups this cycle.
8. Henry Laufer
Donations to Biden groups: $3.5 million | Net worth: $2.6 billion
A former math professor, Laufer followed Simons to Renaissance Technologies, serving as both vice president and chief scientist. He has used his fortune to support Democratic campaigns, donating $2.5 million to pro-Clinton groups in 2016 and $1.6 million to support Biden in 2020. Laufer has disclosed giving $2.3 million so far in 2024, and his wife Marsha has chipped in another $1.2 million.
9. Avram Glazer
Donations to Biden groups: $1.6 million | Net worth: $1.7 billion
Son of sports impresario Malcolm Glazer, Avram Glazer is best known as the co-chairman of Manchester United, in which his family holds a controlling stake. Glazer used to be firmly independent, giving to George W. Bush in 2004, Obama in 2008 and Jeb Bush in 2016. Recently, though, he has leaned more solidly left, donating $700,000 to a Biden PAC in 2020 and pouring $1.7 million into Democratic groups during the 2022 midterms.
10. Amy Goldman Fowler
Donations to Biden groups: $1.2 million | Net worth: $1.1 billion
Heiress Amy Goldman Fowler has written five books for gardeners and won four American Horticultural Society Book Awards, but her money comes from a New York City real estate empire that her father spent decades building. Goldman Fowler has shared some of her family’s fortune with Democratic politicians, sending $1.2 million to groups supporting Biden over the last two years. During the 2018 midterms, she was one of the top donors to Planned Parenthood’s political action committee, dishing out $3 million.
This article was first published on forbes.com and all figures are in USD.
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