According to the latest financial documents, both the campaigns of Hillary and Trump are spending big money in the election race. Although Hillary is spending much faster than Trump, her outstanding fundraising ability and previous accumulations are still expanding her cash advantage.
In August, Hillary’s campaign spending was $174 million, nearly three times that of Trump, who spent $61 million. However, Hillary raised nearly $190 million in the same month, while Trump raised $44.5 million.
With Hillary’s existing funding advantage, this means that by the end of August, she had $235 million in campaign funds available, $100 million more than Trump.
Politico noted that as the election approaches, Hillary’s campaign team highlights its huge advantage in funding and infrastructure, with her available campaign funds far exceeding Trump’s.
Campaign funding has several advantages, as it is directly controlled by the candidate and their closest advisors, and TV advertising rates for campaign activities are higher than external groups. This is important because paid media is the largest expenditure category for both Trump and Hillary to date.
In August, Hillary’s campaign team invested $137 million in media production and advertising purchases, accounting for about 80% of total spending. The remaining expenses included $6.7 million for air travel, $6.4 million for payroll, and $4.5 million for SMS promotion.
For Trump, in August, he spent $47 million on paid media (77%), with an additional $10.1 million on direct mail, while all other expense categories totaled only $4.5 million.
Hillary’s campaign team and the Democratic National Committee have over 1,200 staff, while Trump’s campaign team and the Republican National Committee have about 320 staff.
Since Hillary took over Biden’s campaign, the fundraising and spending of the Democratic campaign team have reversed the previous trend and begun to far surpass Trump’s campaign team.
Of course, direct campaign funding is just one part of the broader political ecosystem. Trump is receiving a lot of external support from the Republican Party and Super PACs, which engage in both traditional advertising purchases and campaigning.
According to independent expenditure reports from the Federal Election Commission, in August, Trump received more external spending than Hillary, with $163 million vs. $104 million.
The Super PAC supporting Trump, “Make America Great Again,” reported raising $25 million in August, including $10 million from Wisconsin billionaire Diane Hendricks and $5 million from Republican major donor Paul Singer. Several other reports indicate organizations that spent heavily on Trump in August, including the American Political Action Committee linked to billionaire Elon Musk, which will not report its donors until October.
Two Super PACs supporting Hillary, FF PAC and American Bridge, reported raising $36 million and $21 million respectively in August. Most of these funds come from non-profit organizations, so the actual donors behind these funds are not yet clear.
The largest individual contributions received by these organizations include $3 million donated by Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz to FF PAC and $2.5 million donated by longtime Democratic donor Deborah Simon to American Bridge.