Trump raised $160 million in September. So far Harris hasn’t released her fundraising figures for September.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/10/02/trump-fundraising-september-2024-00182263
They’re not done counting it all.
The bulk of the spending is in advertising and 25% of the advertising budget is spent in the last 10 days. 50% is spent in the last 30 days. Cite. At the Presidential level this money goes to swing states. (For donors, early money is more effective than late money, since early money goes into staff and late money goes into the ad dump.)
During the 2020 election total political spending topped $14 billion according to NPR. Working with the numbers in my first link, about $8.4 billion of that was in ad spending.
How effective are ads? Then general take is they are highly effective when there’s a great difference in spending - but that doesn’t happen at the Presidential level. Sometimes they are memorable.
Thanks for the info, @Measure_for_Measure - it really is a mind-boggling amount of money on advertising!
It got me thinking: since most political ads are broadly the same in style and content, a lot of their audience will likely ‘tune out’. Would there ever be value in creating a really memorable advert or series of ads that looks more like one you’d expect from a regular company? Where it’s got a bit of a story arc, some humour and/or ‘cinematic feel’? That would have the huge benefit of being talked about which could be worth it.
Umm, zi must disagree, every day should be ice cream day. I mean if you’re taking serious suggetions, that would be mine.
I may be influenced by hearing campaign ads from the next room and being annoyed by them, regardless of the candidate. But the problem here is that Democrats are just as likely to talk about Harris ads as Republicans. You cannot run a Harris ad without reminding both sides to vote, And Democrats (like me) have disproportionately already voted, so you may be mostly reminding Republicans.
This election will be a test of the theory that campaign spending works. If Trump again wins after bring outspent approximately 2 - 1 (as happened in 2016), it should convince a lot of folks that there is such as thing as too much campaign spending.
And if Harris wins, spending billions on presidential campaigns will become a norm.
P.S. Direct mail is also out of hand, with my independent-registered daughter getting Democratic mailings daily. My Democratic-registered wife and I get similar volumes, which can’t hurt even though we already voted.
They don’t want you talking about their ads – they want you feeling their ads. They’re aiming for an emotional response, usually outrage at what the opposition is doing but occasionally hope and warmth toward the candidate they want you to support. Political advertising is designed to be visceral because that’s what motivates people to vote. And fancy gimmicks would just distract from that gut-level impact.
Got it, thanks. I wouldn’t be much use in a political campaign team, obviously!
There are a number of ads that got buzz throughout US history. LBJ’s Daisy ad is one. Bush the Elder’s Willie Horton ad was another. Senate campaigns with low budgets sometimes create viral ads in order get free airplay. Paul Wellstone did this. So did Russ Feingold in 1992.
Mitch McConnell has little charisma (except behind the scenes, where he’s very effective). So he blankets the airwaves with negative advertising, and vocally opposes campaign finance reform because those sorts of television campaigns are expensive. Most advanced democracies have caps on campaign spending, which makes races shorter and encourages efficient spending. The US Supreme Court declared that such limits were illegal in the 1970s due to free speech concerns, thus encouraging public corruption.
US Senators and House Reps spend a good portion of their time raising funds and making cold calls to donors. It doesn’t sound fun to me. But I guess they get used to it: the push for campaign finance reform now comes exclusively from the Democratic side of the aisle, despite wide support from voters of both parties. On this message board, the conservative rejoiner is that campaign finance limits shift power to owners of newspapers. I’m highly dubious, but the objection is not completely without merit.
I didn’t mean to say that there aren’t more outside-of-the-box political advertisements – as @Measure_for_Measure notes, there are a number of campaigns that have taken a more unorthodox approach. These are often longer-shot candidates who need some sort of breakthrough to get noticed, and a watercooler-conversation ad can be just the ticket to building their profile with voters and donors.
Ironically, McConnell launched his career with maybe the most effective campaign commercials in U.S. history. In 1984, he challenged safely ensconced Kentucy Senator Dee Huddleston. McConnell launched a series of ads where a man used bloodhounds to try to track down Huddleston, who had missed several votes allegedly so he could give paid speeches. Up 40 points two months before the election, Huddleston became the only Democratic incumbent to lose their race that year.
I still can’t find how much Harris raised in September. I’m guessing her campaign is afraid to release the numbers for fear it will make donors feel they don’t need to donate anymore.
All I can find are articles saying her campaign has raised 1 billion since she got the nomination. But she raised 771 million in July and August, so a billion total is on track with her current fundraising of about 300-400 million a month.
I hope she raised a lot of money and I hope it translates into a victory.
A Harris win is pretty much a foregone conclusion, however, there may be campaign laws that prevent her from simply transferring the funds to other, less advantageous Democratic campaigns. As such, maybe the best approach would be to simply run ads for other candidates with her name. For instance, if Colin Allred is low on funding in Texas, Kamala could release an ad blitz on his behalf all with her money, saying, “I’m Kamala Harris and I endorse this message.” She could buy a million lawn signs for Allred with her money and Allred’s name on the signs (although maybe Kamala’s own name would have to appear on it too for some legal reason.)