'It's already disastrous': Biden campaign fundraising takes a major hit

President Joe Biden’s campaign has already suffered a major slowdown in donations and officials are bracing for a seismic fundraising hit, with the fallout from a debate nearly two weeks ago taking a sizable toll on operations, according to four sources close to the re-election effort.

“It’s already disastrous,” one of the sources close to Biden’s re-election said of fundraising.

"The money has absolutely shut off" to the Biden campaign, another source close to Biden's re-election said.

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Two of the sources said this month is on a path to be down by possibly half — “or much more,” one of them said — from large donors alone. Sources emphasized that the donations were down across the board.

“Donors are negative. They had a call with the president. The call seemed so contrived to people, I don’t think they buy it,” one of the people close to the campaign said, referencing a recent national fundraising call between Biden and donors. “They called on people who were the most loyal, diehard … There were no tough questions for the president."

Initially after the debate, the campaign reported seeing an uptick in donors. But that quickly fell off, according to the sources.

A Biden campaign spokesperson pushed back on the notion that fundraising was down. "That’s not accurate," spokesperson Lauren Hitt said. "On grassroots fundraising, the first seven days of July were the best start to the month on the campaign — and many of those were first time donors. On the high dollar side, we’ve had folks max out since the debate, as well."

Hitt did not share how many donors have hit the maximum level of giving allowed under federal law since the debate.

One of the people close to the re-election