Trump Outspends Biden on Facebook, Again
Much has been made of how much more Trump spent on digital than Hillary, how much more adept his team [still] is at digital tactics and that late money gets dumped online. Fundraising records have been broken and we’re amidst a global pandemic forcing campaigns online, so it’s interesting to see that in the last 90 days (July 14 — October 12, 2020) Trump has outspent Biden on Facebook by $22M — $78.1M v. $56.3M.
Moreover, a deeper look at state-by-state spending in key states reveals some peculiar, if not alarming surprises. While Biden outspent Trump in Pennsylvania during this 90-day period by 35%, Trump outspent Biden by 35% and 200% in Florida and Texas, respectively. In fact, Texas, which is being hailed as winnable for Dems for the first time in decades, is 2nd highest spend state on Facebook for Trump and tenth for Biden.
What’s going on in Texas?
While Biden isn’t spending nearly as much Trump, the Texas State House is flippable this year — 9 seats needed to flip and about 12 to defend (disclaimer: TFC is working with 27 candidates there this cycle). We crunched the numbers just for the state legislative level and the Democrats have spent about 38% more online than Republicans in the last four weeks (Google + Facebook). But when isolated solely to campaign spend (spend by the actual campaigns), Republicans do spend more.
The most interesting nugget on Texas state legislative races, though, is the difference in where Democrats and Republicans are spending. 51% of Republican State House spend is going to Google, compared to only 20% for the Dems. Why? Could be as simple as one digital consultant working across all of the Republican campaigns and buying YouTube ads for them. Either way, it’s an odd media mix for small campaigns.
Next up, we’ll unpack Florida digital spend…
