JD Vance Won Trump’s Blessing, Now He’s Receiving Money

When former President Donald Trump reluctantly threw a lifeline last week to venture capitalist J.D. Vance’s struggling Senate campaign, he may have shaken up a key area that hasn’t. stable.

Now, a week later, that endorsement has paid dividends.

In a filing Friday with the Federal Election Commission, J.D. Vance to the Senate said it received more money this week than it raised directly in the first three months of the year combined. The report comes after a $3.5 million super PAC injection from Vance’s billionaire backer Peter Thiel earlier this week.

However, a closer look reveals that the skies are not quite as clear as they seem.

First, this all has to do with Vance’s meager overall fundraising rate. In the first three months of the year, his campaign directly raised a total of $38,000. It raised an additional $270,000 from an associate committee and ended March with more than $1.6 million in hand – an amount his top rivals Josh Mandel and Mike Gibbons both doubled. .

But on Friday, exactly a week after winning Trump’s late-game confirmation, Vance reported a personal donation of $88,652. The money came in the form of a wire transfer from a group called the Ohioans to the JD, an official joint committee attached to the campaign.

The cash amount is divided by 50 donations of $1,000 or more. But because of the nuances in filing Federal Election Commission requests close to an election, the total transfer amount can be much higher than that, including smaller dollar amounts. results in reduced reporting.

The flow of people, less than two weeks since the May 3 batch of elementary school, was no doubt welcome in Vance’s camp. And on the surface, the report, along with a huge jump in polls, suggests Trump’s endorsement may have done what billionaire Vance’s backers never did – shifted the needle. political male only.

For months, Vance couldn’t seem to get his polls out of the basement, no matter how much he spent. And his fundraising efforts have begun to dry up, especially in terms of status. He’s been burning through cash, with his final report – covering April 1 through April 13 – showing a $935,000 spend, offsetting a whopping $910 total contribution.

The campaign raised so much cash that at the end of March, Vance took out a $600,000 loan out of his own pocket. To look at that money in perspective, two days before Trump got behind him, the campaign had about $690,000 in the bank.

But that’s just the surface. A closer look at these latest transfers tells a more nuanced story, and suggests that Ohioans may not yet be ready to go all out for their self-proclaimed hero.

For example, it’s not all thanks to the Trump effect. While nearly all of the initial donations to the joint committee were counted on March 31 or later, only 20 of the 50 came after Trump’s April 15 announcement.

(One donation, however, is entirely thanks to Trump — a check for $2,900 from Vance’s chief rival, car salesman Bernie Moreno. Moreno dropped out in February after talking to Trump, promising the former president that he will go after whichever candidate wins the endorsement.)

Perhaps even more troubling, the money was also overwhelmingly sent from out of state, with only 18 donations having an Ohio address. For a candidate whose friendly pollsters have criticized him for failing to connect with the Buckeyes working one day, that’s not necessarily a good sign.

In the same vein, dozens of donations (all out of state) came from people with ties to the financial services industry — $29,105 in total. Contributions from Ohioans amount to just $24,585, with $7,785 of that coming from a single family.

Of course, money doesn’t mean everything, even in politics. But neither is Trump’s undue support of his once-infamous critic — a move that some conservative Buckeyes have blasted.

Still, it’s still worth keeping an eye on the cash. As the unsettled race heads to the May 3 wire, spending could play an important role. Vance can thank Trump for the obvious spike in support, but previous polls have consistently shown a voter with weak attachment to any given candidate. In a Fox News poll conducted last month, two-thirds of those who support one of the top three candidates said they could change their mind.

And the late game surge from the GOP’s most influential force made a concrete difference to Vance financially. His friend and corporate mentor, tech billionaire Peter Thiel, cut a new $3.5 million check for a Vance-backed super PAC, Politico reported Tuesday. Thiel, who hasn’t donated to the team since he pulled $10 million in seed money last March, now has a total of $13.5 million invested in Hillbilly Elegy author.

Before this new round, however, the super PAC, known as the “Protect Ohio Values” (POV PAC), was already fuming. Between January and March, it spent $5.8 million on promotional efforts to get Vance’s numbers out of the basement, with mixed results.

Furthermore, no one gave the super PAC any money during those three months, and at the end of the quarter, the total contribution of the POV PAC was $10.4 million (including Thiel’s original $10 million). ) dropped to about $290,000 – wiping out Thiel’s seed cash and then some.

But after Trump’s announcement, Thiel threw in $3.5 million in rejuvenation and the POV PAC is back online. It quickly spent more than $2.2 million to publish the news.

And as the endorsement is said to have cost Thiel more money, it also seems to have sparked some hacks among Vance’s well-funded competitions, who have already begun to boost accounts. their — and give out — before the May 3 election.

After Thiel’s contribution was reported, lead Mike Gibbons pumped another $250,000 into his campaign account. This is the eighth loan the investment banker has made to date, totaling $16.6 million.

But while Gibbons consistently leads in the polls, he’s only raised $1 million from backers. He pocketed just an extra $6,800 in a report filed days after Vance won Trump’s endorsement.

Another leading contender, former state treasurer Josh Mandel, also rallied this week. Mandel, who is consistently second and ahead of Vance, has amassed $146,000 in donations funneled through his fundraising committee—far ahead of Vance’s recent sum of more than $60,000.

The third candidate, Jane Timken, recently entered the poll behind only Vance. But Timken, a top Republican fundraiser, has strong supporters of her own. Days after Trump weighed in, she received $380,000 in media support from the conservative super PAC Victory for Women.

The endorsement also brought Vance back to number one. A super PAC affiliated with Mandel Advocates for Development Club, which has spent $1.8 million against Vance to date, raked in $170,000 to media last week.

But it also says that at the same time, super PAC backing Mandel even more difficult for others. In the days after Trump got behind Vance, Club For Growth launched $1.3 million attacks – on Mike Gibbons.