Have you heard of Doug Burgum? He is an entrepreneur and a conservative politician who, since 2016, has served as the 33rd governor of North Dakota. Burgum was an angel investor and president of a software company, where he apparently, made a whole lot of money.
Doug Burgum needed 40,000 individual campaign donors to qualify to participate in the Republican presidential primary debates. He wants to be president, and the 40K-donor threshold is a self-imposed rule that the Republicans instituted to ensure that only viable candidates would be able to debate; seemed like a good plan.
So, what would you do if you were Doug Burgum? You are an extremely wealthy former executive that no one outside of North Dakota has ever heard of, and you need 40,000 folks to pony up some cash for your campaign; seems like an impossible hurdle, right? Burgum got creative.
He offered a $20 Visa or Mastercard gift card (he called them “Biden economic relief cards”) to the first 50,000 donors who pledged at least $1 to his campaign. That’s right – donate a buck and get a $20 gift card; no questions asked.
One donor called the offer a “better deal than anything you are seeing during Amazon Prime Day.” So, forget policy, forget experience, forget character – money wins the day. By the way, Burgum has qualified for the debates and is currently polling at one percent. ONE PERCENT!! Money may not buy happiness, but it can get you into the debates.
His campaign reported a second quarter fundraising haul of $11.7 million, the third largest among all Republican candidates. However, it should be noted that $10.2 million of that total was Burgum’s own money.
Other candidates have come up with additional creative methods to hit their targets and go debating. Perry Johnson, a Michigan businessperson who was kicked off the Michigan 2022 gubernatorial ballot when more than 39 percent of his 23,000 petition signers were found to be invalid, is also running for President. Hey, why not? He has cash. He recruited his donors by selling “I stand with Tucker” tee-shirts for a buck. Burgum’s scam seems like a better deal.
Johnson has raised just over $67,000 and contributed more than $320,000 of his own money toward his campaign, according to the Federal Election Commission. Trump raised more than $1 million the day after his latest indictment, so Johnson seems a bit behind.
Obviously if you have millions of dollars, you have a hook, or at least a chance, to qualify for the 2024 presidential debates. If you don’t… Well, what if someone wasn’t rich but still thought he/she would make a good President? Hey, I’m not rich, but if only… Let’s imagine.
Not having billions, or even millions, to buy voter/donor loyalty, a Mac campaign would need to build a platform of actual policies, issues to solve, and solutions to offer. It is a novel approach and may remind you of a simpler political time, but it just might work.
Instead of giving away money, the Mac campaign would offer each donor, for their $20 donation, the opportunity to list one issue or problem that this country faces, and then be entitled to a response of what America should do to address it. No one else is doing THAT!!
In fact, have you heard about any real issue that affects you from another candidate?
Send your issues to rantsbymac@gmail.com, and we’ll send a response, and tell you where to send your twenty bucks. And, once we get 40,000 donors, well, I can’t wait to debate these guys.
The Jeff Burgum approach raises one other point to ponder: suppose Jeff Bezos wanted to run for President. Qualified? Who cares?
Bezos is worth approximately $154 billion, give or take a few bucks. To secure as many votes as Joe Biden got in 2020, he could pull a Doug Burgum and offer each voter an even better deal of $1,000 per vote. After winning with 81 million votes, at a cost of $81 billion, he would have more than $70 billion left, a fairly tidy sum. He could probably still make his car payments.
I have not heard that Bezos is running, but after he reads this… Who knows? He has the tools.
Curt MacRae, lives in Coldwater, MI / publishes rants on rant-able topics at this site.
All published posts are tweeted (@curtmacrae) – direct feedback welcomed at rantsbymac@gmail.com
