Biden Outraised Trump For The First Time, Cutting Into Trump’s Sizeable Cash Advantage

TOPLINE

The Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee outraised the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee in for the first time in April, but Republicans still have double Biden’s cash-on-hand according to FEC filings released today.

KEY FACTS

Key background

Biden’s strong fundraising coincides with consistent leads in national and swing state polls throughout April and May. Still, Democrats remain concerned that Biden’s early lead will evaporate as the campaign drags on and that Trump will outperform his polling in November as he did in 2016. Trump, concerned about the impact of the pandemic on his polling, has begun to look to his 2016 strategy for 2020 success, drumming up conspiracies about Biden’s involvement in unmasking Michael Flynn and his son’s business dealings in China and Ukraine.

Tangent

Democrats have grown gradually more favored to keep the House and recapture the Senate, despite losing a California swing district in a special election in May. Senate polls have consistently shown hotly competitive races in Republican-leaning states, expanding the map of potential pickups for Democrats. Republican congressional candidates, concerned about their chances, have begun to distance themselves from the increasingly unpopular Trump as the coronavirus pandemic as worsened.

Big Number

$2.39 billion. According to FEC data compiled by Forbes, the 2020 presidential election has run up a staggering price tag of $2.39 billion thanks in large part to a collective $1.4 billion spent by billionaires Tom Steyer and Mike Bloomberg in their failed primary campaigns. That already outpaces the cost of the entire 2016 presidential election, which was $2.21 billion.