Trump Is Far Behind Clinton In Campaign Funds

Donald Trump sailed through the primaries while spending very little money. That's because he received a ton of free press coverage (far more than any other candidate of either party) -- and most of that coverage was positive. But those days are over.

The press coverage of Trump and Clinton is roughly equal now -- and much of the coverage of Trump has turned negative (thanks to his own inability to stop saying dumb things). He's going to have to start spending some big money to get his message out the way he wants it. The problem is that his campaign is close to broke.

At the end of May, he had only $1.3 million in the bank for his campaign, while Hillary Clinton had $42 million in the bank. And Trump may not be able to count on a lot of financial help from the Republican Party. The RNC has $40 million less than they had at this point in the 2012 campaign. Trump has now begun to ask for campaign donations, but starting this late he is unlikely to close the funding gap with Clinton. There is no reason to think Clinton's donations will drop, but a lot of big GOP funders are still sitting out the election (unhappy with Trump's candidacy).

Early in the campaign season, Trump bragged that he was filthy rich -- and could self-fund a presidential campaign. I doubt he could really do that, but if he can then he'd better start writing some enormous checks. The Clinton campaign has already reserved time for about $117 million in advertising, while the Trump campaign has only reserved time for about $700 thousand.