When it comes to political fundraising, rich people are great. People who know a lot of rich people are even better.
Individual donors may write the checks, but a lot of influence and power accrues to the intermediaries who collect the money. Known as “bundlers,” they are the financial backbone of many modern campaigns.
“These are essentially fundraisers who aren’t on the payroll,” said Sarah Bryner, research director of the campaign finance watchdog Center for Responsive Politics.
And because campaigns are not legally required to identify them, their influence can be hidden from the public.
The perennial issue of money in politics has received renewed scrutiny in the 2020 Democratic presidential race, with candidates sparring over the influence of big donors. In last week’s debate, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren blasted Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., for a private, ritzy fundraiser held in a wine cave. Buttigieg fired back at Warren, who had, prior to her presidential run, recruited some of the same big donors she now criticizes.
The top candidates have taken distinct fundraising approaches, with former Vice President Joe Biden relying primarily on traditional networks of big-dollar donors, Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., eschewing fundraisers and building massive networks of small-dollar online donors, and Buttigieg doing both but leaning more on big donors.
Warren, in particular, has gone after her rivals for their reliance on major donors, pointing to the potential for conflicts of interest and saying candidates should not be beholden to the already powerful and wealthy.
There’s no requirement that campaigns identify their bundlers, despite their importance and influence. Bundlers often receive ambassadorships and other political appointments, as well as access to candidates and policy-making.
“They’re being very strategic because it’s a way to bolster their reputation,” Robin Kolodny, chair of Temple University’s political science department, said of bundlers. “Are people who try to get close to administrations involved in some kind of quid pro quo? The answer is yes. And that’s exactly what happens when you make a system where everything is based on private money.”
Buttigieg, who first disclosed some of his bundlers in April, released an updated list this month. Biden’s campaign said it would do the same, but didn’t say when.
Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., disclosed her bundlers before she dropped out of the race, and Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, struggling to raise money and gain in the polls, released his list of bundlers last week.
What’s a bundler?
Alan Kessler has considered himself a political fundraiser since 1988, when he worked on then-Tennessee Sen. Al Gore’s presidential campaign. In the years since, Kessler, a top lawyer at Duane Morris in Philadelphia, has amassed a wide network of Democratic donors.
“Not until recently have they termed them ‘bundlers,'” Kessler said. “But it’s not different from what’s been done from the beginning of time — those who not just write checks but solicit people to make contributions at the presidential level.”
A bundler isn’t legally defined except in the case of lobbyists, but the generally accepted understanding is that it’s a person credited with collecting donations from others, often by hosting fundraising events.
Bundlers are powerful
Bundlers essentially have the roles of local ward leaders in classic political machines, Kolodny said. A ward leader has only a single vote, but has power because of the ability to influence family, friends, and neighbors.
Similarly, bundlers can “max out” personally only once, but their power comes from the ability to marshal networks of other donors.
