US Elections: Why Does the “Money Burning” Campaign Ad Matter?

The first debate in the United States general election has just ended and the election has entered a fiery phase. Campaign advertisements, which are fundamental in political marketing, have become a battlefield for soldiers.

In this year’s general election, the total ad spending of the Biden side of Democrats currently leads the side of incumbent President Trump.

In August, Biden’s camp spent $ 65.5 million on television advertising. By comparison, Trump’s field only invested $ 18.7 million. However, the Trump side has put more effort into online advertising.

Also in August, the Trump camp spent $ 4.4 million on ads on the president’s Facebook account alone; In two weeks in August, it also placed $ 13 million in Google ads.

Travis Ridout, a professor of government and politics at Washington State University, analyzed: “The positive sign is that the Trump camp accurately announces certain voters, those who will definitely support them on Election Day. The negative signal is that they have distributed a lot of fundraising messages because they urgently need funds to buy TV commercials.

Campaign financial data released in September this year showed that Biden’s camp currently has $ 466 million in campaign funding, 140 million more than Trump’s camp.

Following the death of liberal Supreme Court Justice Ginsberg, the Democratic Party’s political donations soared, receiving more than $ 100 million in donations in just one weekend.

In addition, billionaire Michael Bloomberg, who participated in the Democratic presidential candidate’s primary elections, recently announced a $ 100 million donation for the Biden Camp campaign in Florida, the largest in US history. Campaign contributions.

American elections are expensive, and funding is critical for elections. However, the one with the most funds raised will not necessarily win. In the 2016 election, Democrat Hillary Clinton raised $ 497 million, much more than Trump’s 247 million, but she lost the White House throne.

From 2019 to the present, nearly 5 million political ads have been shown on US television, representing a national and local television airtime worth $ 2.3 billion. In addition to the announcements for the presidential election, there are also other public office campaigns such as the Senate and House of Representatives and the governor.

The number of political ads in the United States has reached a record high, and in this year’s election campaign ads, the new crown epidemic is the number one problem bearing the brunt.

Michael Franz, professor of government and legal studies at Bowdoin College in Maine, United States, said: “This is a particularly important issue for Democrats who want to retake the Senate and the White House.”

The increase in advertising spending in the two fields is also closely related to the new corona epidemic.

For one thing, large-scale campaign rallies have been canceled and there is nowhere else the campaign camp can spend money.

On the other hand, voters have more time to stay home, watch television or surf the Internet to kill time. “They can’t go to nightclubs so they stay home and watch television. Political ads are a good way to reach voters,” Rideo said.

Due to the electoral voting system of the U.S. General Election, certain states are considered the battlefield states that determine the outcome of the general election. For example, a voter living in Pennsylvania is likely to be overwhelmed by dozens of campaign ads every day.

But in some states that are considered ready for war, such as Louisiana, Montana and Wyoming, Republicans and Democrats have barely announced themselves.

In political advertising, television has always been the medium with the highest participation. This is due to the broad television audience, including voters who are relatively politically neutral and can be persuaded.

“(In television commercials), the campaign camp can talk about the ‘bread and butter’ issues that concern everyone, such as the economy,” Lideo said.

On the Internet, voters will see more partisan ads. “Online advertising will be more polarized and partisan than television advertising.”

Online advertising only accounted for 1% of campaign ad spend in 2010, and by 2020, this share has risen to 27%. In early September this year, political ads placed on Google and Facebook by all parties reached US $ 500 million.

One of the main reasons for the growth of online advertising is that young people no longer obtain information through television.

“If the campaign team wants to talk to young people, they can’t just rely on television advertising, so you see the rapid growth of online advertising,” Frans said.

At the same time, the disinformation circulating on the Internet is increasingly rampant, which can mislead voters. The social media company Facebook announced a few days ago that it will stop accepting new political ads one week before general election day in November and March to reduce the risk of misinformation and election interference.

As the total number of campaign ads increased, the share of negative ads also continued to increase. Negative campaign ads are offensive ads that focus on your competition. In contrast, in positive campaign ads, the campaign camp primarily promotes the merits of its own candidates.

The study found that the share of negative ads has continued to rise since 1960 and fell slightly after 2018, but is still at an all-time high. About half of the ads for the current US presidential election were negative ads.

In the 2020 US presidential election, the first showdown between Trump and Biden over China took place through negative campaign ads.

In April this year, the Trump camp criticized former Vice President Biden, who is expected to represent the Democratic Party in the general election, in an advertisement, calling him “Beijing Biden.” This one-minute campaign ad quoted Biden’s speech in May last year: “Will China eat our lunch? Come on.”

Trump’s group also ran a series of ads that lasted for tens of seconds, showing Biden’s earlier comments that China “are not bad people” and attacking him for repeatedly bowing to China during his more than 40-year political career.

Biden’s campaign immediately turned to color and ran a nearly two-minute long ad with the headline “Insufficient Preparedness,” criticizing Trump for an ineffective response to the epidemic and for relying too much on Beijing, and praising the Chinese government for its response to the epidemic at least 15 times in January and February. .

After several months of mutually criticizing each other’s history with China through campaign ads, Biden and Trump will have a face-to-face confrontation over China’s policy in the first presidential debate in late September.