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- [00:00]
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Host
Hi everybody.
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Cheryl Atkison
Cheryl Atkinson here. Welcome to another edition of Full Measure. After Hours today, the big money donors behind Trump and Harris. In today's podcast, we dig in to look at the big money donors behind Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. From Elon Musk to cryptocurrency interest, there are some fascinating big names and even more fascinating corporations and industries behind the Trump and Harris campaigns in 2024. Our expert we're speaking with who's tracking all of this is Anna Masolia from Open Secrets.
- [01:10]
Anna Masolia
While we're really seeing more money than ever flowing into US elections in 2024, where the presidential race is really dominating and attracting record sums of money, it's becoming the most expensive race in US history. But we're also seeing money going into super PACs, into down ballot races, Senate and House races as well.
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Host
Let's talk about some key figures. When I looked, I was surprised to find there was no Elon Musk donation top on the list. But that's probably about to change. What is the Elon Musk factor?
- [01:40]
Anna Masolia
Elon Musk has really been a game changer for this election cycle. Just a few months ago, he pledged to put $45 million a month into a super PAC called America PAC that he created. We are just now getting those numbers in where we've seen him give about 75 million at this. But more is likely to come in over the final weeks of the election cycle.
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Host
And that's for Trump?
- [01:59]
Anna Masolia
Yes, that's correct. So that's for a super PAC supporting Trump.
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Host
How has that changed? You said that's sort of been a game changer. How has the Elon Musk donation specifically changed things?
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Anna Masolia
The amount that Musk has given puts him among the top donors of the election cycle. Out of nowhere, looking at Musk's history of political contributions, he has given very little over the years, only small sums in the most recent election cycle. And so this is a shift from many prior years when he really hadn't been involved as politically, at least explicitly in elections. And this has the potential to really change the election. Sorry. This really has the potential to have a change in the election because of the pure Sum of money that is going into it.
- [02:41]
Host
When you draw a line from these contributions to what a candidate can do or what benefit comes to a candidate, can you give a specific idea or two, what happens with the money when.
- [02:52]
Anna Masolia
You have a super PAC? Super PACs can raise and spend unlimited sums and spend them on US Elections. Generally this is on spending, attacking or supporting a candidate. Things like advertisements on tv, radio or online. And so that can boost a candidate by increasing their profile and getting people to know who they are, whether that's in a good or bad way, depending on if it's attacking or supporting them. There's a variety of different ways that that money can impact a candidate, whether that's get out the vote efforts, door knocking, or more tangible things like those advertisements.
- [03:24]
Host
Kamala Harris, first full month as the official Democrat nominee, if I'm correct on this, tripled almost Donald Trump's fundraising in that one month. $361 million for her to $130 million for him. I think people might find that surprising. That's a big difference.
- [03:41]
Anna Masolia
It is. And it's a big shift for the Democratic Party as well, where we were seeing donors become very hesitant, in particular after Biden's debate performance in June. Many of them threatene pull their donations or stop donating to the main super PAC supporting Biden as well as to the party in Biden's campaign. When we saw Harris take over, we saw this huge boom in donations kind of shifting, switching the tables where instead of Trump outraising and outspending Harris, we now see the Democratic side becoming more competitive. Harris continuing to bring in money. At this point, we're seeing both candidates raising and spending huge sums. But just that initial bump was unprecedented.
- [04:23]
Host
When it comes to the biggest individual donors, a lot of them are Trump supporters versus Harris supporters. For example, Timothy Mellon is an heir to the Mellon banking fortune. When I looked, he was at about $165 million in for Trump. Any thoughts on that or Timothy Mellon?
- [04:45]
Anna Masolia
Sure. Mellon is one of the newer donors who has emerged this cycle in a very big Similar to Musk, he does not have a long history of giving and making large political contributions. He started about two election cycles giving at least in the tens of millions, which may seem large to the average person, but in the grand scheme of multibillion dollar elections is not a huge amount, especially compared to the amount he's given this cycle where he bumped from just a few million to over 165 million. And we're continuing to see money reported by the super pac that he's funding Make America Great Again Inc. Which where he is just pouring unprecedented sums of money into that, pushing him among the top donors very quickly. Earlier in the election cycle, he was giving to a pro Kennedy super pac, but when Kennedy dropped out, he shifted over to Trump and has poured money in a very big way.
- [05:32]
Host
When I looked the first top donor that was a Harris supporter was number six, and that was Michael Bloomberg of the Bloomberg financial media empire. And former mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg was in when I looked for about $40.8 million for Harris.
- [05:49]
Anna Masolia
Yes, we're seeing Bloomberg pouring money into super PACs and outside groups supporting Harris. Reid Hoffman is another big Democratic donor. But overall, when you're looking at the super PAC mega donors, many of them are Republican. One really important caveat to that though, is that the main hybrid pack supporting Kamala Harris is Future Forward, which is funded by tens of millions of dollars in contributions by its affiliated dark money group. So many of the donors to that super PAC are not known.
- [06:17]
Host
When I looked, Harris biggest money was coming from people affiliated with Alphabet, which owns Google. More than $2 million. That's when we're looking at employees of a company that contribute to a campaign. Trump's most generous donors were from the Defense Department. A total of $286,000. Not nearly as much, at least when I was adding together people affiliated with a certain entity. Any thoughts about that? Google and the Defense Department.
- [06:43]
Anna Masolia
Traditionally, Silicon Valley has leaned more towards Democratic candidates and liberals. And so it's not entirely unexpected to see that trend continue this cycle. That said, one shift we have seen is having other tech executives and employees of tech companies coming out in support of Trump as well. Elon Musk being a great example of that, as well as a number of other more pro cryptocurrency, more radical sectors of that Silicon Valley that are deviating from the traditional norm of support supporting Democrats. So it's not unexpected to see her continuing to draw money from these big tech names like Alphabet Inc. That owns Google. But I think the big shift this cycle has been also seeing other companies that have not traditionally been involved in political spending get involved.
- [07:26]
Host
Is the cryptocurrency industry bigger in donations this time than they have been?
- [07:32]
Anna Masolia
More than ever. We're seeing probably of all the industries, the biggest growth has been in the cryptocurrency industry. One of the top spending super PACs this cycle is Fair Shake, which has two different affiliated PACs that have collectively poured in tens of millions of dollars into the election cycle targeting both candidates. In primaries as well as in the general election. And what makes them really unique is that they don't necessarily support one side or the other. They've attacked candidates on both sides of the aisle, supported candidates on both sides of the aisle as long as they are considered either pro crypto or anti crypto. And so I think that that's been a really unique shift this cycle as well.
- [08:15]
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Host
Do you think the cryptocurrency Is the cryptocurrency industry interested because they're facing the specter of potential regulation? This is a huge time for the development of this form of currency.
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Anna Masolia
It's hard to know what specifically is motivating the cryptocurrency industry to get involved, but we have seen a huge boom in the cryptocurrency industry in recent years and along with that, a risk of regulation, a risk of cracking down on this burgeoning industry. And so it would make sense that they would want to pour money into political spending. We are seeing this increase in political giving coincide with an increase in lobbying spending by the cryptocurrency industry as well, and so oftentimes those can go hand in hand with getting politicians in office who may be more favorable to their lobbying efforts.
- [10:05]
Host
Beyond Alphabet, Google, Harris is also making bank from big tech giants Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Meta and IBM. Those were all in her top 13 givers when I looked. Other cash standouts for her are Stanford, Harvard, University of California, University of Wisconsin and some medical interests. Any thoughts on any of that?
- [10:27]
Anna Masolia
You really do have varied donors, but it can paint a trend of what types of individuals are attracted to each side. You are seeing more things like educational, affiliated donors, academia being attracted to Harris, many government donors on both sides of the aisle. But really big tech, traditional big tech companies do tend to lean more democratic. And so seeing Harris really embrace that has been an interesting component of this cycle.
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Host
For Trump, it looked like it was airlines and aerospace, American Airline, Boeing, Delta, Southwest, Lockheed Martin, United Collins Aerospace, Pratt and Whitney and Raytheon. And then an assortment of real estate, bank, law firm, ups, Amazon, Walmart, Brooks, just sort of this different group of entities supporting him among his top supporters.
- [11:11]
Anna Masolia
Yeah, it's really varied in showing just the diversity of different donors that have become interested. In many cases, different candidates have expressed more favorably to certain businesses than others, certain industries than others. And I think that really shows in the donors as well.
- [11:25]
Host
The most money comes to both Harris and Trump, according to the numbers I saw from retirees, people that don't work for anybody. Is that normally the case?
- [11:34]
Anna Masolia
It is. It is not uncommon for candidates to have their top industry giver to be retirees. This is because retirees collectively make up more people than any individual industry.
- [11:45]
Host
If you want to look at who a lot of industries are supporting one side and not, I'm sorry, supporting both sides. But I tried to find out what top industries are supporting one or the other mostly. And I looked at the industry supporting Harris, but not so much Trump. Were Internet, TV and music, pharmaceuticals, health products, hospitals, nursing homes and nonprofits for Trump mostly supporting him, but not Harris. Tobacco, Pro Israel, oil and gas. Kind of interesting.
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Anna Masolia
It is and it kind of shows the divide. I think a lot of the union support going more towards Democrats traditionally is one of those subcomponents of that for sure. And I think you make a really great point about many major corporations and industries hedging their bets, wanting to support support candidates on both sides of the aisle so that they have someone who's going to be favorable to their lobbying efforts, to their policy changes. When they get it, when that person gets in office, they care less about the partisanship, more about who's going to be favorable to their business.
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Host
You said this is the most expensive presidential campaign ever. Do you have any idea where those numbers are headed?
- [12:50]
Anna Masolia
We are looking at more than $14 billion at this point. We're projecting this to be a new nominal record. Outside spending has already hit a new record where you're seeing spending by groups like Super PACs that can raise and spend unlimited sums on elections already outspending prior cycles. And so not only is it on track for a new record, it is already hitting record marks.
- [13:09]
Host
Starting in 2008, the Democrat presidential candidate has raised far more money than the Republican, and that has usually equated to a win. But the exception was 2016, when Trump did not get the traditional donations that you might have expected. He got from some Republican supporters. And Hillary Clinton outspent Trump 564 million to 333 million. But Trump won anyway. So what does this tell us?
- [13:37]
Anna Masolia
Traditionally, money has equated to a win. Incumbents tend to win more. They tend to get more money. But that is something that's shifted in recent years, Trump being a huge part of that shift, where we're seeing small donors and grassroots donors becoming much more a part of equation. That's not to say that mega donors are going anywhere, but it's not necessarily who has more money that wins. It's whoever resonates with the American people, whoever has their profile out there.
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Host
Do you feel as though Harris is, for all intents and purposes, more like an incumbent because she's coming from an administration that's currently in office, or. Not necessarily. She more like a candidate starting from scratch?
- [14:15]
Anna Masolia
I think both candidates have benefited from existing political infrastructure. Harris, of course, inherited Biden's campaign and all of the money and resources that come along with that. But Trump has been building up his own political operation for several years with his political action committee, Super PACs, and has those preexisting resources as well. So it's a bit of a unique situation to see two candidates having so many resources just going into the election with that.
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Host
It was hard for me to figure out, looking at the numbers, what happened to Biden's money? Had he spent all of his campaign money before he left the race, or did she get to take some of it? How did that work?
- [14:53]
Anna Masolia
Harris did get to inherit Biden's money. He still had over $100 million left when he left the race. But since then, that money has snowballed, and Harris has raised so much more than he had at that point, but did it, but was able to continue to benefit from the money that was left over.
- [15:16]
Cheryl Atkison
For more totals and figures and surprising and interesting information on the fundraising, you can watch the November 3rd episode of full Measure with Sheryl Atkison. If you're listening to this after November 3rd, you can watch a replay at FullMeasure News. We post all of our TV programs and segments there after they air on television. That's FullMeasure News. I hope you enjoyed today's podcast and that if you did, please consider leaving us a terrific review and sharing it with your friends. And if you like the kind of reporting I do, you will also love my second podcast, the Sheryl Atkison Podcast. And if I might say, it's really not too early to start thinking about finding that perfect original gift for somebody you care about. And I'd like to suggest my bestseller Follow the Science How Big Pharma Misleads, Obscures and Prevails Read some of the five star reviews on Amazon and you will see how well documented and cited so much of the information is. These are inside anecdotes, stories, documents, studies that explain how manipulated our scientific information landscape has become. It means it's hard to count on the information that your doctors see in peer reviewed published medical journals. It's hard to count on what your doctors tell you about your own health, what the medical associations say, what our public health agencies say, and what you read in the news or on big Tech. I explain the reasons behind it and also give you some important tools to help you navigate this manipulated information landscape in a way that will really help you improve your health. And I think Follow the Science explains in a way that no book I've seen does. The unique and corrupting dynamics that are going on between big Media, Big Pharma, the federal government and political groups, and the medical establishment that involves all of our doctors. Not that certainly they are in on some sort of corruption personally, but they are working within a system that probably they don't even realize is so often dishonest and corrupted with money interest. That's Follow the Science How Big Pharma Misleads, Obscures and Prevails do your own research. Make up your own mind. Think for yourself.