FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

News

Donald Trump might be rich — but his campaign isn't

Even after doubling his campaign budget last month, the Republican nominee is still spending half as much as Hillary Clinton's operation.
Foto di Shawn Thew/EPA

Donald Trump doubled his campaign spending last month — but he's still shelling out less than half as much as Hillary Clinton's operation, according to Federal Election Commission documents filed on Sunday.

The Republican nominee spent about $18.5 million on campaign operations in July, compared to about $38 million spent by Clinton. In addition to outspending him, Trump's Democratic challenger is also out-fundraising him by a wide margin. Clinton raised $52 million in July compared to Trump's $37 million — a sum that included $2 million from the real estate tycoon's own deep pockets.

Advertisement

Related: Paul Manafort resigns as Trump's campaign manager after week of staff shakeups

While Clinton maintains a campaign staff of about 700 with field offices across the country, Trump is still campaigning with a skeleton crew of around 70 employees, according to the Associated Press. While skimping on personnel, Trump has shelled out for some unusual expenditures, including spending more than $420,000 on his trademark "Make America Great Again" hats.

Trump also paid $8,656 for travel lodging at the Mar-A-Lago, a lavish club he owns in Palm Beach, Florida, plus another $2 million for private jets. Per the AP, the air travel costs came in addition to $500,000 in payments to Trump's own TAG Air.

The news agency noted that Trump's campaign also wrote a $20,000 check to Green Monster Consulting, the firm that belongs to his former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski. The payment came two weeks after Lewandowski left the campaign and became a commentator for CNN. The news agency also reported that Meredith McIver, the Trump organization employee who took the blame for writing Melania Trump's partially plagiarized speech at the Republican convention, was paid $356.01 by the campaign last month.

Related: Hillary Clinton made $10 million last year and paid a third of that in taxes

Trump allocated $5 million this week for his first major campaign ads of the election. Clinton, meanwhile, has been running ads for months, and has spent $60 million on them so far.

The candidates also raised significant chunks of change for their respective parties, with Trump bringing in $80 million for the GOP and Clinton netting $90 million for the Democrats.

Follow Tess Owen on Twitter: @misstessowen