What Can Democrats Do With All That Money?

Vice President Joe Biden (D-DE)

We still don't know what is going to happen on November 3rd.  There is clearly a lot of excitement on both sides of the aisle (for all of the amazing photos you saw in Austin & Atlanta this week of early voting, don't skip out on noticing that many red counties are also posting crazy numbers of early voters), but with just under 20 days to go, a question needs to be asked around fundraising.  This morning, Steve Bullock, Mark Kelly, Amy McGrath, & Jon Ossoff all posted $20 million+ numbers for the third quarter, a feat matched by John Hickenlooper, Jaime Harrison, Theresa Greenfield, & Cal Cunningham.  This is on top of major hauls for Al Gross, Barbara Bollier, & Raphael Warnock, and it's before the Democrats even have posted numbers in Maine.  All of this is on top of record hauls by the DCCC & DSCC this cycle, what looks like to be a significant advantage for the Democrats in the House compared to the Republicans, a rare cycle where (in recent months) the DNC somehow out-earned the RNC (that almost never happens), and then of course there's Joe Biden.  Biden brought in an astounding $383 million in September, besting his August fundraising of $364 million, and has $432 million on-hand.  With just a few weeks to go before the election, the Democratic Party is sitting on a mountain of cash that you just don't see in politics this late in an election year.

The bigger story here is that the Republicans don't appear to be close to these numbers.  Tellingly, the GOP has been reluctant to release their corresponding numbers in a few of these races headed into the finale, and while there are races where the cash-on-hand is comparable or even beats the Democrat (Michigan & Texas come to mind), in many cases its embarrassingly low.  Joni Ernst raised a fourth of the money that Greenfield did in arguably the biggest coin toss race on the map (i.e. a race the Republicans should have been doing better); Dan Sullivan & Thom Tillis posted equally paltry sums in their states.  And while we're still waiting on the Trump numbers (legally they have until midnight to get them out), the campaign's removal of ads in key swing states like Ohio, Minnesota, and Iowa does not indicate that they'll be able to compete with Biden in terms of cash.  So as a result, the Democrats have not only a fortune in campaign donations right now, but they also have something we almost never see in a presidential race-a distinct, large cash advantage over the other party.

The question is-what the hell can they do with this kind of money in less than three weeks?  Ads are obviously an option, but you can only buy so many ads, and bizarrely the Democrats get ads that are cheaper because donations to a campaign make for cheaper ads than those from a PAC (if the Republicans want to make up the ad war game, they have to do so at a higher premium).  Supposedly the Democrats have aired 80% more ads already than Republicans, but there's only so many ads between now and November 3rd, and even if you start going into "reach" markets (Joe Biden has started advertising on Christian Radio Networks in hopes of converting the traditionally Trump-leaning Evangelicals, while Jaime Harrison is advertising in North Carolina & Georgia because those media markets overlap into some areas of South Carolina-these are both things you wouldn't normally do), ad dollars have a case of diminishing returns.

So I think the Democrats, particularly Joe Biden, need to take a quick moment, and start spending this  money on running-the-board in November.  Right now we are in a rare circumstance where Biden is probably going to win, and it looks likelier than he'll win in a landslide than him narrowly losing.  So I think we are at the point where you have enough money that you can both protect the wall and play the field; in 2016 Clinton had a choice between the two and didn't protect her left flank, but Biden doesn't have to worry about that in the same way considering his higher poll numbers and much better fundraising numbers.

MJ Hegar (D-TX)

You see indications that this is happening, particularly in Texas.  The Senate Majority PAC (an arm of the DSCC) just up with an $8.6 million ad buy in Texas to boost MJ Hegar, one of the Democrats currently under-performing Joe Biden and still struggling with name recognition...two areas where cash on advertising will absolutely help the cause (the only other Senate races where this is the case are Ossoff & Warnock in Georgia, and Gary Peters in Michigan, so increased donations/advertising there could help as well).  One of the reasons that Democrats have been reluctant to play in Texas in the past is in part because it's too expensive-why spend $100 million on one Senate seat when you can try and have three Senate seats in Montana, Iowa, & Kansas for the same amount?  That we're seeing this investment in Hegar not only shows that this race is getting closer, but its also a sign that the Democrats don't want to leave any potential victories on the table, even if it costs a fortune to get them. If it costs tens of millions to make Hegar competitive, this cycle they can do that without serious repercussions.

So my hope is that the Biden campaign starts getting strategic not just about turning out voters, but also where they're turning out voters.  Make a play at North Carolina, but particularly in the 8th district, where the Democrats have an increasingly competitive House race.  The same with Ohio's 1st or Florida's 26th.  We have a distinct advantage of getting the number of voters we have to turnout in November out early (as opposed to the Republicans, who are hampered by President Trump's attacks on early & absentee voting), so you can hire an army of volunteers to start micro-targeting Democrats who haven't voted yet, or focus on communities of color or younger voters who swing Democratic but occasionally suffer from lower turnout.  This money advantage could be a waste of time if handled improperly, but it could also be used to start a groundswell of targeting in key swing districts (even as far down as state legislative seats) to deliver Biden the kind of win we haven't seen for a presidential candidate since 2008, or perhaps even 1980.