Trump-era ushers in historic, early reelection spending
President Trump has upended a lot of norms in politics, but one worth taking a look at is his effect on presidential-cycle spending.
A lot's been made about Trump's historic fundraising haul for an incumbent president. The first incumbent to begin fundraising in earnest the moment he was sworn in, Trump’s campaign alone raised more than $60 million this cycle (and the combined effort with joint fundraising committees eclipsed $100 million). Those figures don’t even include donations from the final three months of this year.
Former President Obama raised about $4 million directly to his campaign account in 2009 and 2010 respectively.
An uncharacteristically large war chest at this point of the cycle has allowed Trump to spend heavily. His campaign committee spent more than $32 million through the third quarter of 2018, with top expenditures going to advertising, paying legal fees and to the company that makes signature campaign apparel like the "Make America Great Again" hats.
The Obama campaign spent $10.4 million during his first two years in office, much of that on advertising and legal fees.
Outside groups, predominately Republican ones, have taken a queue from Trump and are too spending a historic amount. There's been $11.7 million in independent expenditures supporting Trump's reelection effort, and just $190,000 in spending opposing him.
Between 2009 and 2010, outside groups spent just $680,000 on the presidential race, with all but $44,000 of that being spent in support of Obama.
The books aren't closed on 2018 yet, so these numbers are bound to climb once final reports are due in early January. And the totals don't include money spent by other affiliated groups like national parties that could also help in the reelection bid.
What's clear now is that the Trump era has ushered in an unprecedented amount of reelection spending so early in the process. But what's not clear is whether this will be the new normal or a Trump-specific phenomenon.