Vice President Kamala Harris outspent former President Donald Trump by 20-1 on Facebook and Instagram in the week surrounding their debate, capitalizing on the moment to plaster battleground states with ads and to hunt for new donors nationwide.

Company Records Show Spending

The lopsided spending — $12.2 million to $611,228 on Meta’s platforms, according to company records — was hardly an outlier. Ever since Harris entered the race, her campaign has overwhelmed the Trump operation with an avalanche of digital advertising, outspending his team by tens of millions of dollars and setting off alarm among some Republicans.

Four years ago Trump, then holding the White House, drastically outspent Democrats online early in the election cycle in hopes of gaining an advantage. Now Trump, facing a cash shortfall, is making a very different bet that emphasizes the unique appeal of his online brand, the durability of a donor list built over nearly a decade and his belief in the power of television.

The difference was especially stark on screens across the most contested states in the week surrounding the debate. In Pennsylvania, Harris spent $1.3 million on Meta’s platforms, compared with $22,465 by Trump. In Michigan, she laid out $1.5 million, while he spent only $34,790.

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“We just can’t afford to abandon a platform to Democrats,” warned Eric Wilson, a Republican digital strategist and the executive director of the Center for Campaign Innovation, which presses conservatives to embrace technology.

Trump’s campaign has spent far more heavily on Google, especially on YouTube ads that can closely resemble traditional television. (Google owns YouTube.) But even on Google, a New York Times analysis of advertising records in the seven top battleground states shows that Harris’ political committees have doubled Trump’s spending, $25.7 million to $12.8 million, since she joined the race.

Trump has courted digital-first audiences in other ways, stopping by a bitcoin bar in New York this week; talking with YouTube stars, streamers and podcasters; joining TikTok; and even creating his own social platform, Truth Social. But his comparatively light paid digital presence could mean he fails to reach potential supporters.

Social media has become an important theater of combat for campaigns, both as a source of grassroots fundraising and as a place to draw younger and undecided voters who do not rely on television for their news. And in a close election, being able to motivate and turn out less engaged but persuadable voters online could make the difference. The digital spending gap is fueling some Democratic optimism about November, even as polling shows an ultracompetitive race.

“It’s a massive strategic advantage,” Kenneth Pennington, a Democratic digital strategist, said of Harris’ spending. “And the Trump campaign just seems to be asleep at the wheel.”

“Harris is running a more modern campaign,” he added.

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Trump Campaign Says They Do Not Need to Spend as Much

Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for Trump’s campaign, said it did not need to spend as much because voters voluntarily consume content about the former president. “The Harris campaign must spend an enormous amount on digital advertising, and we don’t because our campaign’s greatest asset is President Donald J. Trump,” she said. “Millions of people want to organically watch and engage with President Trump — you can’t put a dollar value on that.”

Trump is also being outspent on television — but by smaller margins. Part of that emphasis reflects Trump’s own worldview. Trump, who starred in the network television show “The Apprentice,” has said privately that he thinks digital spending is a waste and has urged his campaign to spend more on TV, according to a person who has heard him make such remarks and insisted on anonymity to discuss his private comments.

Trump is benefiting from online spending by some Republican super political action committees, but it is hardly enough to match that of Harris.

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Part of the reason for Harris’ advertising edge is that she has more cash: She doubled Trump’s fundraising haul in July and August. But the digital disparity also reflects the structure and priorities of each campaign. One of Harris’ deputy campaign managers is a former top digital strategist, while the Trump campaign does not have a digital expert in its top ranks.

Chris LaCivita, one of Trump’s co-campaign managers, said his team had plenty of expertise.

“The collective experience in message delivery in the Trump for President campaign exceeds over 100 years,” he said. “And it also includes the timing of the onset of the internet as to where it is today. We’ve been part of that growth the entire time.”

Trump Advertising on Certain Platforms

Trump has not yet advertised on Snap, where Harris’ campaign has spent $3.2 million since she became a candidate, company records show. There is one platform where Trump is spending and Harris is not: X, the Elon Musk-owned social platform, though the former president’s sum is relatively paltry, a little more than $100,000 since the vice president entered the race.

Spending the most money is hardly a sure bet in presidential politics. Elections are often decided by broader societal forces or world events. Trump won in 2016 when he was significantly outspent. But the last two presidential races have been so close — determined by tens of thousands of votes — that every little edge is potentially decisive.

Still, the overall partisan gap in online spending is especially striking because Trump so heavily prioritized online spending in 2020. And some of his advisers credited a Facebook-centered strategy for helping him win in 2016.

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The ads that Trump is running on Facebook reveal some tactical decisions. In the past month, his campaign has spent more on ads featuring the page of Alina Habba, one of his telegenic lawyers and advisers, than on those for Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, his running mate. The Habba ads are meant to encourage small donors to contribute.

“Do we not have the best-looking team in the world?” Habba asks in one ad, as she walks around the campaign’s office. “Yeah, we do.”

One advantage of digital ads is that they can be tailored to reach specific demographics.

The Trump campaign, for instance, is running ads on Google targeting women in urban centers of battleground states about his promise to make in vitro fertilization treatments free. The ads are pink with the words, in all capital letters: “Do you want more babies? Trump does.”

For her part, Harris is running an ad in the area around Dearborn, Michigan, which has a large population of Arab and Muslim Americans, featuring her efforts “to end the suffering in Gaza.”

Michael Duncan, a Republican digital strategist, said that Trump’s pullback from Facebook was understandable.

“Donald Trump has been running for president for nine years, and nobody in the history of politics has spent more money on Facebook trying to find donors,” he explained, adding that the platform had become less efficient for Republicans in general.

Duncan said that the Trump campaign’s imperative is to run negative ads defining Harris, and that Facebook and Instagram were generally weaker platforms for that purpose. “It’s harder to persuade people with video on Facebook because they can scroll past it,” he said.

Rob Flaherty, the deputy campaign manager for Harris with a background in digital strategy, said that her campaign intended to spread its message in every way possible.

“In an election that will be incredibly close, we think it’s a good bet to invest in our voters and reach them everywhere that will inform how they vote this fall — whether it’s online or in their communities,” he wrote in a statement.

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The Democratic digital spending advantage is a big change from previous cycles, when Trump seemed poised to put Republicans more in control of the online ecosystem.

“In 2016, the Trump campaign ran a much more sophisticated digital operation than Democrats,” said Tara McGowan, who served as the digital director of Priorities USA, then the party’s main super PAC. “So Democrats worked really, really, really hard to ensure that wouldn’t happen again.”

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Shane Goldmacher and Nicholas Nehamas/Kenny Holston
c. 2024 The New York Times Company