Kamala Harris spends big with media firm that boosted Bernie Sanders' national profile

Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris (Calif.) has paid the online media firm that helped propel Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders during his dark horse run for the 2016 Democratic primary more than $400,000 this year, filings show.

Revolution Messaging LLC, a Washington, D.C.-based progressive online media firm founded by Scott Goodstein, an online director for Obama for America in 2008, was instrumental in helping push Sanders's message out and raise his profile during his race against Hillary Clinton by creating his digital and branding strategy.

"In the spring of 2015, before the campaign launched, we knew Bernie Sanders was a leader who stood on the right side of history," the group wrote in their case study. "But Bernie was polling around 3 percent, had no establishment support, little name recognition and was running against a popular and ‘inevitable' Democratic primary opponent. We had our work cut out for us. With no offline fundraising team, no Super PAC, and no Wall Street money, we would have to raise almost all of the campaign’s money from small-dollar donations."

Revolution ultimately helped Sanders raise $218 million online and has won numerous awards for their work on behalf of his campaign.

Harris, who is commonly floated as a potential candidate for president in 2020, paid the firm large sums of money for the likes of advertising despite not being up for reelection in her home state of California until 2022.

Harris's Senate campaign began paying Revolution Messaging in July 2016, Federal Election Commission records show. From July 7 to Election Day, the campaign paid the firm $381,632 for advertising and campaign consulting. From Election Day to the end of the year, an additional$122,000 in payments from Harris's campaign were made to Revolution.

Click for more from The Washington Free Beacon.