He’s New York’s favorite mayor — and he works about 700 miles away!
The Big Apple showered Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg — the mayor of tiny South Bend, Indiana — with $2.35 million in donations during the past three months, Buttigieg’s campaign revealed Tuesday.
The haul is more than twice the $1.1 million that Mayor Bill de Blasio raised in total — nationwide — since launching his own White House bid in May.
Buttigieg also humiliated de Blasio in his own back yard by collecting contributions from 14,000 city residents, more than twice de Blasio’s total 6,700 donors.
“Pete has an important message that is resonating with people in New York and all over the country, and that’s one about generational change and not just winning an election but winning an era,” Buttigieg spokesman Chris Meagher said.
Buttigieg’s local supporters include such quintessential Gothamites as longtime Vogue editor Anna Wintour, media tycoon Barry Diller and financier Bill Ackman, who each made maximum contributions of $2,800, with Ackman doubling down for both the primary and general elections.
Other boldface names who used their city addresses to back Buttigieg include Michael Douglas, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jesse Eisenberg and Jane Lynch.
Longtime de Blasio supporter Steve Buscemi — who gave his former Park Slope neighbor the maximum for the primary and general elections — even hedged those bets by giving Buttigieg $500.
Buttigieg led the Democratic field by raking in $24.9 million from 294,000 donors during the second quarter of 2019.
On the final day of the quarter, de Blasio tried to boost his anemic take through a series of desperate emails pleading with supporters to chip in just $1 each.
De Blasio’s donors include Brooklyn Democratic Party counsel Frank Carone, who made headlines earlier this year when it was revealed he represented notorious slumlords Jay and Stuart Podolsky in the sale of 17 buildings to the city for $173.5 million — $30 million over the appraised value.
Carone and his lawyer wife each made $2,800 contributions, as did four other lawyers and an employee at the Abrams, Fensterman firm — where Carone is the executive partner — and one lawyer’s spouse, according to de Blasio’s Federal Election Commission filing.
A spokesman for Carone called him and his wife “unwavering supporters of the mayor going back many years,” and said Carone was “proud that a Brooklyn Dem is fighting for the US presidency.”
Other notable, maximum de Blasio donors include leading real estate developers William Zeckendorf and Aby Rosen, builder Martin Loy and hotelier Richard Born and several partners.
Several teachers, including some from Rhode Island and Tennessee, also each made $2,800 contributions.
De Blasio’s literal “cousin Vinnie” — TV writer and producer Vinnie Wilhelm of Los Angeles — chipped in $250.
De Blasio has likely qualified for the second round of Democratic primary debates in Detroit later this month, but faces an uphill battle to secure a spot on stage for September’s third round of debates in Houston.
The threshold for participating in that face-off is at least 2 percent support in national polls and 130,000 unique donors.
Election expert Larry Sabato said de Blasio “will have to engineer a couple of miracles to make it.”
“He wasn’t appealing in the first debate, and he’ll have to do spectacularly in the end-of-July debate if he is to remain on stage,” said Sabato, director of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics.
“At this point, de Blasio is barely mentioned during discussions of the Democratic contest.”
De Blasio campaign spokeswoman Jaclyn Rothenberg said: “The mayor had three goals when he got into the race: raise over $1 million, have a strong debate performance and start staffing up. He accomplished all three.”