Biden and his allies have raised more money than Trump and his allies throughout the general election, but the surge in post-conviction donations to Trump’s activities, documented in part in a May report filed with the Federal Election Commission on Thursday, could dramatically change the complexion of the presidential race.
The Biden campaign’s long-standing fundraising lead has given it far more clout than the Trump campaign, and it has also significantly outspent the Trump campaign in television advertising. The latest fundraising results put the Trump campaign in a position to launch a larger operation and air more television ads.
A full picture of each campaign’s financial strength won’t become clear until later this summer, when the campaigns’ affiliated committees must submit reports. But reports filed late Thursday showed that the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee had a combined cash holding of $171 million as of the end of May, surpassing the combined $157 million held by the Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
Trump’s advisers say May’s donations surge was due to donors wanting to demonstrate their loyalty to him after he was convicted of a felony. The campaign claimed it raised $53 million online within 24 hours of the verdict, but the total was not possible to verify as of Thursday because WinRed, the platform many small donors use to give to Republican campaigns, won’t file FEC reports for that period until July.
MAGA Inc., the Trump-allied super PAC that has been the primary outlet for airing pro-Trump ads on the radio, received a staggering $50 million in donations from transportation executive Timothy Mellon the day after Trump’s conviction, giving the former president’s allies ample resources to spread their message at a time when Trump is leading Biden in opinion polls in many battleground states.
In a recent memo obtained by The Washington Post, the super PAC announced it plans to spend $100 million on paid media through Labor Day.
MAGA Inc. raised $69 million in May, its biggest fundraising month ever, and reported having $94 million in cash on hand. The company’s largest donation was $50 million from Mellon, who has given $25 million to the group and $25 million to a super PAC supporting independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Trump and the Republican National Committee, who began fundraising together when Trump became the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, raised about $106 million in May, surpassing their previous monthly total, according to new filings with the Federal Election Commission. Biden and the Democratic National Committee raised a combined $59 million, matching their previous total.
The Biden campaign said it had a total of $212 million in cash on hand as of May 31.
In addition to the donation from Mellon, MAGA Inc. received $10 million from Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, who are major donors to conservative causes, and $5 million from Kelcy Warren, the billionaire chairman and CEO of Energy Transfer Partners, the company building the Dakota Access Pipeline.
FF PAC, an independent super PAC backing Biden’s reelection, reported raising more than $39 million in May, up from previous months when it spent just $4 million, but FF PAC was outraised by MAGA Inc. and, for the first time this season, has slightly less cash on hand than the pro-Trump super PACs.
Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg donated $19 million to FF PAC on May 30, according to filings. He also donated $929,600, the largest amount, to the Biden Victory Fund, a joint venture between the campaign and other Democratic committees, according to a person familiar with the donations.
While Trump was fending off Republican challengers in the Republican primary, Biden was getting a head start on fundraising with the Democratic National Committee and other coordinated committees.
Biden’s deep coffers allow him to spend freely on television ads, and his campaign is trying to shore up support among key constituencies such as Black and Latino voters, who have been less enthusiastic about the campaign than they were in 2020.
The Biden campaign says it has opened more than 200 offices and hired 1,000 staffers, and has already spent more than $65 million on television ads, according to ad tracking firm AdImpact.
The Trump campaign said it has dozens of offices in battleground states that it operates in conjunction with the Republican National Committee, but has not provided details about the scale of the operation beyond saying a massive paid and volunteer operation is “growing every day.” The Trump campaign had not aired a single general election ad on television as of Thursday, according to AdImpact.
Advisers to the Trump campaign have said they are building a leaner, more efficient operation than past campaigns and will rely on outside groups to supplement their local efforts, but Biden campaign battleground states director Dan Kanninen on Thursday pointed to infrastructure inconsistencies.
“With just over four months until the election, Donald Trump cannot afford to compete with our battleground state infrastructure,” Kanninen said in a statement. “While the Trump campaign is desperately trying to portray the lack of infrastructure as ‘strategic,’ at the end of the day, Donald Trump cannot make up for lost time, and you can’t win by campaigning without seeing.”
Trump adviser Jason Miller pointed to the former president’s lead in polls in battleground states, arguing in a statement on Thursday that “Biden only needs to win 1,000 more votes in states like Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, because Biden is losing to President Trump in all of these states.”
Biden ran a major campaign that raised more than $90 million in March, but then had a less aggressive fundraising push in April and May, at which point his entire operation had about $192 million in cash on hand, nearly double the cash reported by the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee at the end of that month.
Trump outraised Biden in April but legal costs are putting a strain on his campaign as he defends himself in four criminal cases. Trump has paid much of the legal costs for himself and some of his allies through a leadership PAC called Save America, which typically takes a $5,000 cut of each of the more than $11,600 it contributes to the Trump 47 Committee.
According to documents filed Thursday, Save America raised just $4,337 in May but spent $4.3 million, leaving it with less than $4.5 million available for spending that month. Legal costs made up 85 percent of the PAC’s May spending, and it also had $862,000 in unpaid legal fees.
The party committees vying for control of the House and Senate also released their latest figures Thursday night. The Democratic House Campaign Committee reported having $78.8 million in cash on hand, narrowly losing out to the Republican House Campaign Committee, which reported $64.7 million in cash at the end of the month.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee reported $48.3 million in cash, compared with $41 million for the Republican Senatorial Committee. The DSCC raised $10.6 million in May, while the NRSC raised $12.4 million.
Suzie Webb contributed to this report.
