With data from Open Secrets, Hillary Clinton’s political fundraising and spending eclipses Donald Trump’s by almost fourfold.
Clinton has raised approximately $375 million between her campaign, PACs, super PACs, 501(c)(4) politically active nonprofits, and other satellites. Of this total, approximately $290 million has been spent, thus far.
Trump has raised approximately $99 million via the aforementioned avenues, of which approximately $76 million has been spent.
Among Clinton’s largest contributors are Saban Capital Group ($10 million), Soros Fund Management ($7 million), assorted investment firms, venture capital groups, and labor unions.
Trump’s largest contributor is John Powers Middleton Companies, which donated $150,000.
Left-wing ABC News reported on Wednesday that Clinton and her largest super PAC have spent about $93 million on television advertising, of which about $56 million came from Clinton’s campaign. I contrast, $11 million has been spent by outside groups supporting Trump.
Trump’s campaign has not yet spent a dollar on television advertising.
Most of the money spent by Clinton’s campaign and its satellites on television advertising has been in Florida and Ohio.
Astute political observers know that operational costs of left-wing and Democrat-aligned news media – from CNN to The New York Times to MSNBC to The Washington Post to the Huffington Post to BuzzFeed to Politico to The Economist to The Atlantic to the BBC to Al-Jazeera – are not included as political expenditures by watchdog groups like Open Secrets.
Also omitted are operational costs of popular culture content, from ESPN to Hollywood to “lifestyle” magazines and tabloids to contemporary musical artists and associated awards shows.
Democrats enjoy billions of dollars of dollars worth of political content friendly to their causes from a new media landscape still mostly aligned with them.
The total volume of money captured by Open Secrets and recorded as political expenditures is but a fraction of the total spent on efforts to shape peoples’ politics.
Sean England poses for a photograph with a Ready for Hillary t-shirt at the Ready for Hillary super Pac store in Arlington, Va, on Friday, April 3, 2015. The super pac that has promoted Hillary Clinton on college campuses, at Democratic rallies and book signings for the former secretary of state will wind down their operations if and when Clinton announces her campaign for president. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Posters of Hilary Clinton hang on the way as intern Emily Perlstein packs up an order at the Ready for Hillary super Pac store in Arlington, Va, on Friday, April 3, 2015. The super pac that has promoted Hillary Clinton on college campuses, at Democratic rallies and book signings for the former secretary of state will wind down their operations if and when Clinton announces her campaign for president. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
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