Biden’s Financial Advantage Grows as Trump’s Campaign Faces Challenges

TFD – Delve into the evolving financial landscape of the Biden and Trump campaigns, with Biden’s coffers swelling while Trump faces mounting challenges and legal hurdles.

President Joe Biden’s political operation has expanded its financial advantage over former President Donald Trump’s campaign as the two men hurtle toward an expected general election confrontation, new filings show.

Compared to Trump’s identical account, which had little more than $30 million in cash reserves, Biden’s campaign had approximately $56 million in cash on hand at the beginning of February.

Additionally, the president, who spent a portion of Tuesday touring California for fundraising, is still collecting large sums of money from supporters despite his mounting legal issues that are draining their funds and his rival, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, refusing to end her long-shot bid for the Republican nomination.

Haley, who has pledged to continue competing until Super Tuesday, had just less than $13 million in cash on hand at the beginning of February after spending more than she had raised in January, according to recent filings.

Key conclusions from Tuesday’s campaign filings are as follows:

An early benefit for Biden

Presidents in office usually have an advantage when it comes to fundraising, and Biden’s campaign concluded in January with substantial financial resources. This week, it revealed that all of its allied committees had $130 million in cash on hand at the beginning of February.

(Tuesday’s filings cover only a portion of each presidential candidate’s political operation. The campaigns and national parties report fundraising totals on a monthly basis, but filings from joint fundraising committees – detailing their fundraising cash reserves – are not due until later this year.)

In 2020, Biden and his affiliated committees reported having more than $200 million in financial reserves, but that figure still pales in comparison to what Trump and the Republican National Committee had amassed by this time.

However, Biden can gather funds in tandem with the national party as the president in 2024 and put money aside for the costly general election battle that lies ahead. It was anticipated that his fundraising tour to the West Coast would generate up to $10 million.

Party dominance

In January, the Democratic National Committee raised $17.4 million, more than its Republican counterpart, and completed the month with $24 million in accessible funds. That greatly exceeds

The RNC’s available cash of $8.7 million was slightly higher than the $8 million it reported having in reserves at the end of the previous year, but it is still the lowest amount it has had in almost ten years.

In January, the RNC received approximately $11.6 million in revenue.

The outgoing chair, Ronna McDaniel, is planning to step down later this month as part of the RNC’s massive changes as Trump gets ready to reshape the party’s infrastructure. The RNC’s low cash reserves have been a major source of concern for the party.

The RNC’s financial reserves, which were last reported at $8.7 million, are still well below the peak of over $90 million that was reached as recently as 2021. This is the lowest amount since early 2015.

Despite being the front-runner in the GOP, Trump has not yet officially secured the nomination and combined his campaign machinery with the RNC’s. This will allow his close allies to run the committee’s operations and finances and is anticipated to increase party fundraising.

Cash for pro-Haley super PACs declines following a spending binge in January.

The primary super PAC behind Haley’s presidential campaign, SFA Fund, spent a lot of money in January and ended up with just $1.9 million in cash on hand. Despite this, the former governor of South Carolina is determined to continue her campaign, despite her diminishing war chest.

The SFA Fund spent nearly $13.7 million during the first presidential primary contests in January, having raised about $12.1 million in January. Six-figure contributions came from executives and financiers like Tim Draper, a venture capitalist based in California, Warren Stephens, an investment banker in Arkansas, and Jim Davis, the head of New Balance.

As a result, the organization had just roughly $1.9 million in cash on hand at the beginning of February.

The SFA Fund has now disclosed that it has spent around to $80 million overall to assist Haley’s White House quest; despite this substantial outlay, Trump’s overwhelming advantage in the presidential primary has not been weakened. Haley hasn’t prevailed in any of the early state competitions despite the money spent.

So far in February, the group has continued to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars each on dozens of pro-Haley independent expenditures, according to FEC filings, suggesting it has continued to receive donations.

A super PAC representative was unavailable for comment on Tuesday night.

Haley has promised to stick with her campaign past this Saturday’s primary in her home state, where polls indicate that she is far behind Trump.

She declared on Tuesday, “I’m campaigning every day, until the last person votes.”

Two of Trump’s closest advisors stated in a recent document that Haley has little chance of winning the nomination and that the former president will pick up the delegates required to conclude the GOP primary fight the following month.

Trump’s legal issues and attorney fees continue to grow.

Trump continues to amass electoral victories in the early vote states, but his legal issues are getting worse.

In addition to 91 criminal indictments in four jurisdictions, he now faces hundreds of millions of dollars in damages from two recent civil fraud judgments in New York. The hush money case in New York, which is Trump’s first criminal trial, is scheduled to start on March 25.

According to documents released on Tuesday, Trump’s leadership PAC gave more than $2.9 million to legal firms last month as his legal issues grew, and at the end of January, he still owed $1.9 million in unpaid legal costs.

Last year alone, Save America spent more than $55 million on legal bills, accounting for nearly 85% of its spending. Ten percent of the funds raised online by Trump’s campaign organization are donated to Save America.

Save America has also retrieved millions of dollars from a super PAC founded to support Trump’s presidential campaign, as the former president’s legal expenses have grown. Records indicate that the super PAC MAGA Inc. returned $5 million to Save America this month, on top of $42.25 million it had given back to the organization the previous year.

Trump has unjustifiably characterized the legal issues as a component of an extensive political witch hunt meant to sabotage his presidential campaign.

RFK Jr. spends a lot of money.

According to recent reports, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who is launching an independent presidential campaign, received almost $2.7 million in revenue last month but spent over $3.2 million.

He had about $4.9 million left in the bank at the end of January. There are concerns that this scion of one of the most famous families in Democratic politics may steal votes from Biden due to his ongoing candidacy.

Kennedy’s super PAC, American Values, has stated that it will use up to $15 million to place Kennedy on the ballot in states that are crucial to the race. Additionally, according to documents released on Tuesday, Republican megadonor Timothy Mellon, the heir to the Mellon banking dynasty, continues to be one of the super PAC’s top supporters. More than half of the money raised by the Kennedy super PAC in January was contributed by Wyoming-based Mellon, which gave $5 million to the organization last month.

At the conclusion of the month, American Values had a substantial war chest with more than $23 million in cash on hand.

Additionally, Mellon gave $5 million to a super PAC supporting Trump last month.