Tell us fundraising is slow for Democrats without telling us fundraising is slow. One indication may be the little video posted on Joe Biden’s X account (formerly known as Twitter) hawking a piece of campaign merchandise.

Joe Biden is embracing his inner Dark Brandon. He takes a sip from a coffee mug with an image of him in sunglasses and the text “2024”, including his eyes colored red. Team Biden thinks this is being clever. Biden thinks he looks cool. Normal people look at the video and think it’s an old man drinking coffee and he looks kinda creepy.

A cup of Joe never tasted better.

Grab yours: https://t.co/4fbxCBQNPZ pic.twitter.com/s2qboyE7C1

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 3, 2023

I wonder how many takes that little sip of coffee took.

That little piece of campaign merch will cost you $22.00. The campaign is selling other items with the Dark Brandon meme, too.

The term “Dark Brandon” is a play on the phrase “Let’s Go, Brandon,” an anti-Biden chant that started in late 2021. Since “Dark Brandon” was created in 2022, it has been shared by several politicians and even White House staff members.

Earlier this year, the Biden campaign started selling T-shirts featuring the joke after his 2024 reelection campaign was launched in April. Some of the merchandise available to purchase included a $32 “Dark T-shirt” featuring the “Dark Brandon” meme.

As usual, Joe Biden is on vacation. Something that is hard to avoid noticing is that his social media team is working overtime posting tweets on his official account and the volume of posts has increased since Biden declared his candidacy. No one should believe that Joe Biden is posting his own tweets. Most of them boast about whatever the theme of the day is – it is usually Bidenomics now. Biden has averaged more than 35% of every month in office on vacation since he began his term as president. So far, Biden has spent all or part of 196 days at his Wilmington, Delaware house, 50 days at the Rehoboth Beach house, and 96 days at Camp David. He has been away from the White House for about 370 days. Wowser.

Frankly, I’ll note his many absences but I won’t complain that Biden is out of the White House and hunkering down at one of his homes or at Camp David. The less he is at work, the less damage he can do to America. He can go sit on the beach or ride a bike all he wants. I don’t care. Keep him busy and distracted from doing his day job. He’s done more than enough damage to our country.

Politico reports today that there is a massive decline in small dollar contributions to Democrats. ActBlue, the donation processor for Democrats, found that there was a drop-off of more than $30M compared to this point in 2020. And, there was a 32% drop in second quarter donations compared to 2020. That shows a lack of enthusiasm from voters, which shouldn’t be a surprise, given the majority of Democrat voters don’t want Biden to run for re-election. There is also a lack of enthusiasm for Kamala Harris. The grassroots just aren’t into either of them.

The Dark Brandon mug is one way to try to attract attention to the campaign. It shows Old Yeller is in on the meme and rolls with it. Will grassroots voters embrace the hype and fork out what little disposable income they may have – thanks to Bidenflation – or will the mugs fail to inspire small donations?

It’s still early in the election cycle and Biden is presumed the party’s nominee. The fact that the day he launched his campaign was one of the biggest days for campaign donations and since then, there has been a significant drop, indicates that Biden has failed to harness enthusiasm in voters. That’s not a good sign. Campaigns are supposed to gain steam, not evaporate, as they go along.

All this may be good news for Republicans going forward into the 2024 presidential election. No one should think it is going to be an easy election, though, or take anything for granted. Our country is too deeply divided and many voters on both sides of the aisle may just sit this one out because of a lack of enthusiasm of a repeat Biden-Trump showdown. Significant drops in small donor contributions isn’t a good sign.