Kamala Harris’s campaign raised three times more money in August than Donald Trump – $360 million over Trump’s $130 million, leaving Harris with near double the amount of cash on hand going into the election without even counting September. As with everything else, campaigns run on money. The financial discrepancy – along with some weird Trump priorities, leave Team-Red increasingly scared according to a new report in The Washington Post.
There are only a few hundred thousand undecided voters and even fewer in key swing states. Those few and their ultimate vote will decide the election. How the campaigns reach the pivotal voters is the biggest priority. To that end, the Harris campaign intends to run much longer than usual ads and commercials – more “infomercials” than traditional television. These ads will be run in key states like Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. The longer and ideally compelling commercials are a product of the money Harris has in reserve, money that the Trump campaign simply cannot match.
It is now bothering Trump’s inner-campaign management. The ever- essential Rawstory states:
RNC co-chair Lara Trump has privately worried that her father-in-law isn’t spending enough on digital advertising (which includes social media placement and ads on video streaming platforms like YouTube).
The digital advertising market is even harder to measure than traditional television media. At least with television one can look at ratings and area of impact. Not so much with platforms like YouTube and especially social media.
Donald Trump’s task is made even more difficult due to his strange focus on “election integrity,” made up of 175,000 volunteer poll-watchers and post-election litigation. It is hard to tell what poll-watchers can do other than possibly intimidate more vulnerable voters like people of color, perhaps young voters, perhaps the elderly, anyone who might be trying to avoid conflict as they go to vote. Other than that? What is a poll-watcher supposed to do? Each side has representatives who monitor the actual tabulation of votes when counted. It is a dubious strategy to shower with money – but Donald Trump wants it, badly. It scares top managers in his team.
The report also states that the Trump team is spending a lot of money on post-voting day litigation teams. But even that is kind of weird because the Harris campaign has certainly covered those expenses. Additionally, legal fees shouldn’t cost as much money as the ads, nor the get out-the-vote effort. Post-election litigation is also something for which they can raise money fast after the election. To that end, the Harris campaign has taken the most aggressive steps in history now, before the vote. According to Alternet:
[T]he Harris/Walz campaign has announced a whopping $370 million investment in campaign advertising between Labor Day and Election Day. $170 million of that will be for TV ads, and the other $200 million will be for digital advertising on digital platforms. The campaign called it “the largest digital reservation in the history of American politics,” with a goal to “reach voters where they are.”
Yes, well – it’s a pretty crazed ad-buy if it only reaches voters where they “were” or at a blind side, so the “where they are” is kind of a throwaway. All campaigns do so. It is how they evaluate the placement, where the campaign believes they reach voters that matters.
Donald Trump must not be able to match these types of broad expenditures – no one can, unless they have the historic hauls like that of Harris. But there are even greater pit-falls for Trump. The majority of his voters are rural, older, and white – people who by definition are more spread out. The diffuse base makes mass media more difficult. This could really really matter in hurricane ravaged North Carolina and Georgia, where big cities bore less of a brunt than rural roads and smaller towns, all making it harder to vote for people who are already spread out.
All of this leads to fear and concern inside the Trump campaign and Republican National Committee leadership. Harris’s big money edge could be hard to overcome. Indeed, Trump’s team worries that money alone will be definitive.
It is highly ironic that a wealthy real-estate mogul could lose to a lifelong public servant with big money. Even better, cash is a sign of enthusiasm, which correlates to actual votes. It will be very interesting and fraught with tension in both camps.
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And here I foolishly thought his complete incompetence during his four years in office, his criminal convictions, his racism, bigotry, and misogyny, his piss-poor running mate choice as well as unpopular policy choices, and his abject stupidity were going to be deciding factors. What could I be thinking?
There is one thing to be concerned about: space karen. He will likely open up his wallet to the tune of who knows how fucking much. Now, I don’t know if there is ad time to be bought since I would think V.P. Harris, the Dem Pacs, etc. probably have much of it purchased already. von shitzinpants and his team stupidly thought he was a shoo-in. Reckon they’re finding out otherwise.
how to reach hurricane victims no wifi unless emergency satellite. I’m concerned that musk gives either money or crypto to Trump’s and Trump Jr. crypto organization after Butler.