I had one reader who question whether or not Donald Trump actually wanted to be president or if, instead, all that we have seen to date is a narcissistic, ego driven reality TV game for the man. One has to wonder when one looks at the current state of Trump's campaign, both in terms campaign funds on hand and the lack of a staff equal to the task of a national campaign. A piece in Politico looks at the disaster that is the Trump campaign - something that may fuel the "Dump Trump" movement and keep GOP donors clutching their closed wallets. Oh, and note how Trump continues to pay himself and his organization with campaign funds. Some say that Trump will self-fund, but will he? His money may be too precious for him to part with. Here are some story excerpts:
Donald Trump's campaign started the month with a paltry $1.3 million in cash — a mere fraction of Hillary Clinton's $42.5 million war chest — putting the GOP frontrunner at a sharp disadvantage heading into the general election against Clinton's money machine.
On the same day that Trump fired his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, amid a steady stream of reports of campaign infighting and disorganization, the latest batch of Federal Election Commission filings show that the real estate mogul has a long way to go to establish a financial operation that can compete at the national level.
And it's not just money — the filings revealed a campaign staff of less than 70, a number was dwarfed by Clinton's nearly 700 paid employees, and few of the campaign's expenses suggested work had begun to build out a more robust operation. All together, it's the most lopsided fundraising start to a presidential election in the modern campaign finance era.
[T]he campaign showed no clear path for improving its financial picture. Trump raised just $3.1 million from donors (including almost $2 million in amounts less than $200) and lent his campaign another $2.2 million, though he said he won't continue self-funding through the general election. Trump has now loaned his campaign a total of$45.7 million, almost exactly the same amount that Mitt Romney loaned his 2008 campaign for the GOP presidential nomination.
Though his campaign trimmed spending from $9.4 million in April to $6.7 million in May, it finished May with just $1.3 million cash on hand. By contrast, the Clinton campaign ended the month with $42.5 million in the tank. Even the defunct campaigns of Ted Cruz and Ben Carson had more cash on hand than Trump's. In fact, several House members running for reelection have more cash on hand than Trump's campaign.
The campaign's disarray doesn't stop with its finances: On Monday, Trump fired his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, after a turf war with chairman Paul Manafort paralyzed the campaign's ability to staff up and hone its general-election message.
The May FEC report showed just 69 people on payroll, to Clinton's 685. And the Trump campaign's spending offered no signs of building a national campaign infrastructure.
By comparison, the campaign spent only $48,000 on data management and $115,000 on online advertising.
The Trump campaign has yet to reserve any airtime for advertising in the fall, and he may not be able to rely on super PACs. The real estate mogul's inflammatory attacks on a federal judge and renewed calls for a ban on Muslim immigration have failed to endear him to the party's leading donors, and one of the main outside groups supporting him, Great America PAC, raised just $1.4 million in May.
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