Biden’s $80.8 Million Outpaced Trump’s Fund-Raising in May

The monthly filings with the Federal Election Commission do not include the full details of the committees which Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump operate jointly with the two political parties; those will be revealed in July.

With news that Mr. Biden’s fund-raising had outpaced the president’s for the first time, Republican officials sought to minimize the Democrats’ edge in May while touting what they called a Republican war chest of $265 million in cash. Mr. Biden’s campaign has not voluntarily disclosed his full cash figure.

“May was Biden’s first full month as the Democrat nominee, and with that brought advantages of higher fund-raising limits and the full weight of the Democrat Party,” the R.N.C. said in a statement on Saturday. “Biden was still unable to make a dent in the massive cash-on-hand advantages that the Trump campaign and R.N.C. enjoys."

Dick Wadhams, a veteran Colorado Republican strategist, said the coronavirus outbreak had had little bearing on big-dollar giving, including in down-ballot races. “The pandemic certainly has restricted the candidates’ ability to raise money at events,” he said, “but these major donors on both sides, they don’t need to go to an event and have a glass of wine to write checks to their candidate.”

Indeed, big-dollar contributions to super PACs were still strong in May, the new filings showed. For example, significant donations to the Senate Leadership Fund, a Republican-aligned super PAC, came from Bernard Marcus, a co-founder of Home Depot who gave $2 million, and Warren A. Stephens, an Arkansas businessman who contributed $1 million.

Mr. Wadhams called Mr. Trump’s fund-raising machine critical to boosting Republicans in competitive Senate races like the one in Colorado.

In that contest, Senator Cory Gardner, the Republican incumbent, was outraised in recent months by one of his Democratic challengers, former Gov. John Hickenlooper. Mr. Hickenlooper’s campaign has had recent stumbles yet received $3.7 million from April 1 to June 10 — $1.6 million more than Mr. Gardner raised. As of this month, however, Mr. Gardner still had roughly $3.4 million more in cash on hand than Mr. Hickenlooper did, thanks in large part to the Republican Party’s support.