US polls: Harris enters election’s final phase with huge financial edge, but will it translate to votes?

New York: Democrat Kamala Harris enters the final phase of the US election with a huge financial advantage with her campaign committee raising $997.2 million from January to October 16, while Trump’s campaign committee hauled in only $388 million.

But the proverbial $64 million question is if it would translate to votes.

The fundraising amounts in the filings by both their committees with the Federal Election Commission do not include the money raised by groups affiliated with them or by political action committees that can spend on campaigns to support them as long as they do not have any direct connections to the candidates.

As of October 16, the Harris campaign had $118 million cash in hand for the final sprint, and Trump’s campaign $36.2 million.

The fundraising disparity of $609.2 million translates into spending on advertising, giving Harris a big advantage.

Her campaign and supporters spent $644 million more than Republican Donald Trump and his backers with the help of affiliated groups.

Since March, Democrats — campaigns of President Joe Biden, before he dropped out and Harris, who took over, as well as affiliated groups — have spent $1.6 billion, according to an analysis of election finance data by AdImpact that was carried out by National Public Radio(NPR), which is partially funded by the government.

The Trump campaign, and groups supporting him, have spent only $956 million, according to the NPR analysis.

These amounts went to advertising campaigns by the two candidates and their affiliates.

Despite the big gap in spending, opinion polls show Trump with a slight lead — RealClear Polling’s aggregation gives him a 1.6 per cent advantage as of Saturdays, although the real vote figures will be known only after the voting ends in three days and the numbers are tabulated.

According to NPR’s analysis, a total of $10.5 billion has been spent so far on all the elections, from the municipal to the presidential, in the current cycle from January.

Here, too, the Democrats have outspent the Republicans, $5 billion to $4.1 billion, according to NPR.

In the presidential campaigns, most of the spending has been directed to the seven swing states where neither party has an established majority and the results could go either way.

Pennsylvania, which both parties consider vital and can be won by them, has seen the most spending, with Democrats pouring in $637 million to Republican’s $534 million.

The expenditure there eclipses the national spending outside the swing states, which the NPR analysis says is $489 million by Democrats and $286 million by Republicans.

The two top spenders were the Harris campaign which expended $513 million, and Future Forward Political Action Committee, $441 million.

Trump-supporting MAGA (Make American Great Again) group came in third with $360 million and Trump’s campaign was fifth with $327 million.

–IANS