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It's been a rough few days for Ken Martin.
A burst of stories has raised fresh questions about the Democratic National Committee chair's temperament and lack of fundraising prowess. But the more consequential problem continues to be the committee's books.
The DNC ended June with $16.3 million in cash and $18.5 million in debt - putting it about $2.2 million in the red. It is a staggering hole compared to the numbers of the Republican National Committee, which held $128.5 million and reported no debt.
For months, Martin and his allies have predicted that Democratic victories and the approaching midterms would bring major donors back. The midterms are now approaching. The money has not followed.
Martin is not new to criticism. But beneath the latest turmoil is the problem that has dogged his tenure from the start: Cash.
Few Democrats expected the DNC to keep up with a Donald Trump-led Republican Party that controls all levers of power in Washington. Martin's allies note that his committee is doing better than the committee at a comparable time in 2018 and spending the money it raises to help build infrastructure and invest in state parties. But for more than a year, it has failed to reassure major donors that its finances are improving - or back up when they said they would."
"It's slow. ... There is still the hangover from 2024 for big donors," Jaime Harrison, Martin's predecessor who still fully supports his besieged successor, told us of big money fundraising. "That is the real rub. They just need to warm up."
We reported in April that Martin had been telling people for months that a string of Democratic victories last November would lead to a fundraising boost. The wins happened, but the money didn't follow, especially from moneyed donors.
At the time, Democrats close to Martin suggested things would turn around in the coming months, as donors and voters began to pay more attention to the coming midterms.
That has not happened.
Top-dollar Democratic donors continue to sit on their hands - and checkbooks - as the committee struggles to raise money. Republicans, meanwhile, are swimming in it à la Scrooge McDuck.
According to Clara Ence Morse, our ace data reporter, six individuals donated at least $100,000 in June to the Democratic National Committee or its Grassroots Victory Fund committee. By comparison, in the first half of 2026, 35 individuals gave $100,000 or more to the Democratic committee or its fund. Meanwhile, the figure for the Republican National Committee alone is 154. And its many fundraising committees have raised millions more from megadonors.
Democratic committee officials say its high-dollar fundraising remains ahead of the comparable point in 2018, the last time a midterm under a Republican president. In June 2018, they said, only three donors gave at least $100,000 to the committee, half of what they received this June.
"They do have a different type of donor base, they do have a different way that finances are arranged, and they do have historically a different philosophy," Chris Lowe, the committee's national finance co-chair, said of Republicans. "So, I'm not sure we are ever going to view ourselves as directly in financial competition there."
Martin himself used a lengthy Substack post to argue that power, not money, should be the grading scale of his DNC, pointing to all the wins Democrats have notched nationwide. And DNC officials have sought to compare this iteration of the committee with 2018, not the Republicans they are currently fighting.
But in another move of the goalposts, some Democrats are now telling us that they don't expect top-dollar donors to come back to the Democratic National Committee until right before the midterms, once it is clear that Democrats have a good chance to flip the House and possibly take the Senate.
"I don't feel like this can be fixed between now and November," said Rufus Gifford, a longtime Democratic fundraiser who wrote a blistering criticism of the committee he once worked for. Gifford, who is hosting fundraisers for House and Senate candidates in the coming weeks, said his "focus is on making sure we win back the House and the Senate and then going into 2027. That is when I really feel like we need to fully address the issues that are on the table with the DNC."
Lowe responded to critics by arguing the committee's shift from relying on major dollar donors to living on grassroots donations reflects "a massive change in how political fundraising operates."
"None of this comes easy," Lowe concluded. "We have what we would say is quite an aggressive budget. We're ahead of that budget so far this year. And I think we will continue to be ahead of or meet that budget this year."
Even so, it is unlikely Martin will be going anywhere anytime soon.
First, he has received votes of confidence from some of the party's most powerful officials.
"The chairman has my full support," House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York) said while campaigning in Pennsylvania over the weekend. "We look forward to our continued partnership."
But second, and possibly more important, is that it is difficult to remove a DNC chair. Many members remain loyal to Martin. And under the bylaws, the chair often controls when the committee meets.
Political pressure can force a chair to resign, however. Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned as chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee in July 2016 ahead of the party's national convention after leaked emails showed she and party officials preferred Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders in the party's presidential nominating process.
That just isn't likely to happen before the midterms. We spoke to multiple DNC members on Monday who flatly said there was no effort afoot to oust Martin, despite some public agitation for his departure.
What happens after the midterms is more of an open question.
"They keep moving the goalposts," said a Democratic strategist close to the committee. But they argued those money questions will become particularly important once the Democratic committee turns its focus to the presidential nominating process, its central function. "And the buck comes due for 2028 when the goalposts can't move anymore."
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