The campaign team has a "money shortage", Trump has to fight for re-election out of his pocket
"At all costs, we must win! Because this is the most important election in our country's history." On September 8, local time, US President Trump said when asked how much money he was willing to spend on campaigning. This year's campaign funds are one to two times more than four years ago, and he will use his funds to fight for re-election if necessary.
He said: "If it must be so (out of pocket), I will do it."
There are comments that less than 60 days before the polling day of the general election, the Trump campaign faced a financial dilemma, indicating that his previous financial advantage no longer exists.
Raising campaign funds should have been one of Trump's greatest advantages.
Four years ago, on the day of Trump's inauguration, he formed a re-election committee and launched a re-election campaign to raise funds.
In March of this year, when the Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Biden "resurrected" in the party's primary election, Trump and the Republican National Committee (RNC) already held $200 million in campaign funds.
However, in less than 5 months, the "silver bullet advantage" of 200 million US dollars has evaporated.
According to the New York Times reported on September 8, from the beginning of 2019 to July 2020, the Trump team and the Republican Party raised $1.1 billion, and more than $800 million has been spent, of which more than $350 million has been For fundraising activities, more than $100 million was used for TV commercials before the Republican Party Congress.
Since deciding to run for reelection in 2018, Trump has appointed two campaign team managers: Brad Paskel and Bill Stepion.
Under their leadership, the campaign team formulated a comprehensive, carpet-like publicity plan for Trump. Its strengths include: manual visits to tickets, social media advertising, campaign advertisements at major sports events, and "swing states." And e-commerce advertising and so on.
Among them, manual visits to visit tickets and "swing state" advertising are traditional methods of bipartisan elections, but social media and e-commerce advertising are more "to please Trump himself", and they are all generous.
Take social media as an example. Because of Trump’s “Tweet-ruling” hobby, Pasker, the campaign manager, has invested more than $800,000 to increase his presence on “Facebook” and “Photo Wall” (Instagram). The page traffic of the account to expand the promotional effect of Trump advertising.
But later because of little success, Pascal was dismissed in July this year.
For another example, the Trump campaign once invested $1 million in advertising expenses in an e-commerce company in Washington. The New York Times commented on the 8th that it was useless, just because "Trump who lives in (Washington) DC likes watch TV".
Failure to adjust the campaign strategy in time according to changes in the current situation is another important reason why Trump's nearly 1 billion campaign funds have been squandered.
After the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the Biden campaign team quickly basically abandoned the propaganda method of visiting tickets. The Trump team still arranged more than 2,000 employees to visit tickets in 100 areas.
At the same time, affected by the epidemic, the influence of major sporting events was deeply affected, but just to compete with Bloomberg in a 60-second "Super Bowl" advertisement at the time, the Trump team spent it. 11 million US dollars.
Advertising investment is so huge, but judging from the reality that Trump has been lagging behind in polls for months, advertising has achieved little effect.
"You spent 800 million, and you are still 10 points behind. I think you have to respond to what your plan is." Senior Republican Ed Rollins accused the former manager of the Trump campaign. Pascal said that he spent money "like a drunk sailor."
According to the practice of the US general election, the two-party party congress and the critical sprint period for the next two months are when the two parties are spending money to grab votes. But now, members of the Trump team admit that there is a serious shortage of funds. .
The Trump team’s financial crisis had symptoms as early as July.
Late on the night of July 15, Trump announced on social media Facebook to "promote Bill Stepion to the position of manager of the Trump campaign."
Later, although Stepion insisted that "there is sufficient funds to win the election," several details revealed the truth.
In an interview, Stepion accidentally revealed that "the most important thing every day is to keep an eye on the budget."
He also had to cancel some campaign projects due to funding reasons.
In this regard, Jason Miller, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign team, explained that keeping the cash is to ensure that the necessary "ammunition" is available, and the advertising expenses that Biden spends will eventually prove to be "pure waste." .
Although Stepion has strictly controlled campaign expenses, poor fundraising may still put the Trump team and the Republican Party into a situation of insufficient campaign funds in the next 50 days.
According to the latest data disclosed by the US media, as of the end of July this year, the Trump campaign still held 300 million US dollars in funds, and the Biden team had 294 million US dollars.
In August, Biden and the Democratic National Committee raised $364.5 million, more than twice the amount raised by Trump and the Republican National Committee ($165 million) during the same period.
Among them, more than half of Biden's August fundraising (205 million US dollars) came from small donations from millions of grassroots supporters.
According to the analysis of the New York Times and other media, the reason why Biden was able to "catch up" with Trump, who had an early financial advantage, was because his team adopted a "minimalist campaign" strategy in the most severe months of the epidemic, which not only controlled In addition to campaign expenses, he also raised tens of millions of dollars online through video conferencing software Zoom.
But Trump despised this fundraising model and mocked Biden from time to time for "hiding in the basement to campaign."
Campaign funding is the basic "threshold" for participating in the US presidential election, and it is no exception for incumbent presidents seeking re-election.
After the "New York Times" published an article about Trump's insufficient funds for the campaign, the Trump team also announced an increase in fundraising efforts and followed Biden's example in launching an "email offensive" for online fundraising.
For example, sending emails through the personal accounts of Trump himself and some well-known figures in his family to promote a limited edition of Trump’s personalized signature photos; paid opportunities to take photos with Trump or attend presidential candidates’ debates. Fundraising.
In addition, Trump has stated on the 8th that if campaign funding difficulties are difficult to resolve, he will use personal funds when necessary.
He tweeted that if necessary, he would provide personal funds for the re-election campaign, but he suspects that there is no such need, implying that he does not think his team will have a financial crisis.
In the 2016 presidential election, Trump personally contributed $66 million to participate in the campaign.
Our newspaper, Beijing, September 9th
China Youth Daily·China Youth Daily reporter Chen Xiaoru Source: China Youth Daily