Subject: There is a ‘Draft Joe Biden’ super PAC now. It’s even hiring a fundraiser. - The Washington Post
From: "Eric Schwerin" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 23 Mar 2015 14:47:08 -0400

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/in-the-loop/wp/2015/03/23/job-opening-raise-money-to-draft-joe-biden-to-run-in-2016/

There is a ‘Draft Joe Biden’ super PAC now. It’s even hiring a fundraiser.

Vice President Biden pauses while addressing the Human Rights Campaign Spring Equity Convention. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen)
If you’re a Joe Biden fan waiting wistfully by the phone, passing over the Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders draft efforts because there’s only one for you – it’s time to get out your checkbooks.

The Draft Joe Biden super PAC is finally here, formally filing with the Federal Election Commission last week. And it’s hiring an “experienced fundraising consultant” to catch up.

The job announcement posted on the Google group “JobsthatareLEFT” seeks someone who has worked the money side in at least two campaigns, better if they were federal. You need a “proven track record in fundraising,” as well as specific experience raising money online. You have to manage donor relations and put together a plan “with the end goal of a consistent revenue stream.” (It’s a long time until November 2016.)

[Ted Cruz: ‘I am running for president of the United States’]

The Biden team has some catching up to do. Ready for Hillary has been around for more than two years and had raised $12 million by the end of 2014. Ready for Warren had raised almost $100,000. Draft Bernie reported bringing in $6,819.

Will Pierce, a 26-year-old Democratic campaign staffer, based in Washington, but who said he lives mostly out of a suitcase, is the organizing director behind the Biden effort.

“I think he has a really good chance of getting in, and a really good chance of winning,” Pierce told the Loop. “We’re going to be expanding and growing to show him from a distance this is the level of support you’re getting.”

[July 2014: Is Biden calling up the troops for 2016?]

With the new committee is also a runbidenrun.com site to coordinate volunteers, raise money and petition Biden to get in the presidential race.

“Why Biden? Quite simply, WHY NOT BIDEN?” it asks. The petition, signed by 3,976 as of Monday afternoon, tells the vice president that he must finish the work of the Obama administration. “The job is yours to do,” it says.

The love letter to Joe says the country’s “Average Joes” need him. An election “between another Bush and a Clinton, in spite of whatever one feels about them personally, makes mockery of the belief that anyone can be president.”

Pierce said the draft effort was born out of about 100 former Obama volunteers starting a dialogue several months ago about wanting Biden to run. There’s no multimillionaire backer behind it (so far), but the fundraiser job is paid – though nominally.

Their goal is to raise $25,000 before the end of this month and then start putting field teams together in the early primary states.

Biden’s office did not immediately return request for comment. He has said he’d make a decision about running by the end of the summer.

Are we alone picturing Biden staring in the mirror channeling his inner Sally Field, saying, “You like me, you really like me.”