Down-ballot Democrats dramatically outspend Republicans online

Among non-presidential candidates, Democrats are spending over 80% of total digital dollars

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Apr 26, 2024

In addition to writing about random internet things that may or may not be impacting our politics, we’re also in the weeds each week closely tracking digital ad spending trends on both sides of the aisle. As the 2024 election cycle has begun to kick into gear, we’ve noticed one clear macro-trend emerging: Republicans are spending way less on digital advertising across the board.

Let’s set aside the presidential election for a moment, where the Biden campaign continues to spend 5x more online than Donald Trump’s team. We analyzed the ad spend of the 100 highest-spending non-presidential political candidates on Facebook, Instagram, Google, and YouTube in the past 90 days. Here’s what we found:

This data includes spending for any non-presidential campaign - from key congressional races to governors, state legislators, and municipal office holders.

Among this group, Democratic down-ballot candidates accounted for 86.2% of all Facebook and Instagram political spending, while Republican candidates only made up 13.8% of spending on those platforms. On Google and YouTube, the picture was similar: down-ballot Democratic campaigns spent 80.6% of digital ad dollars to 19.4% for Republicans.

It’s hard to see what’s behind this trend. We reached out to a few digital strategists on the Left and Right to try and figure it out, and most attributed it to campaigns’ fundraising ROI, as most ad spending at this stage in the cycle is to bring in grassroots dollars.

We’re told Democrats are still seeing some kind of return on their ad spend, often relying on Facebook ads earlier in the cycle to bring in potential donors they can hit up for more cash throughout the campaign. On the Right, that may not be the case.

“Down-ballot Republican candidates face challenges in small-dollar fundraising, leading to hesitancy in budget allocation without a guaranteed acceptable return,” Tom Newhouse, Strategic Advisor for GOP-aligned firm Convergence Media, told FWIW.

“Factors contributing to this cautious approach include the intense Facebook ad spending by campaigns like Trump's in the 2016 and 2020 cycles and the NRSC's in the 2022 cycle, Apple's impactful privacy changes in 2021, and Facebook's implementation of various targeting restrictions in recent years. These factors collectively have made it difficult for Republicans to achieve a strong ROAS on the platform,” Newhouse added.

Digital ad spending, by the numbers:

FWIW, political advertisers spent just over $9.4 million on Facebook and Instagram ads last week. These were the top ten spenders nationwide:

Meanwhile, political campaigns spent $3.6 million on Google and YouTube ads last week. Here were the top ten spenders nationwide:

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) is up for re-election this year, and although his state has become pretty safe for Republicans, his campaign is not taking anything for granted. They’re running a wave of new video ads, featuring Scott speaking direct-to-camera in an attempt at Spanish to attack the “socialism in Washington.”

On the Left, we found that League of Conservation Voters is running this absolute journey of an ad supporting President Biden.

On Snapchat, political advertisers in the U.S. have spent $1.2 million on ads year to date. Here are the top spenders:

The Biden campaign is running a new ad featuring a TikTok-style video of presumably a Zoomer talking about the Trump v. Biden match-up in front of a “green screen” displaying relevant news stories. These ads are also running on YouTube.

…and on X (formerly Twitter), political advertisers have spent over $8.8 million on the platform in 2024. Here are the top spending accounts:

It’s important to note that X remains the only major social platform where Republicans are outspending Democrats on advertising in 2024. Donald Trump’s campaign remains the largest political advertiser on X to date.

Your 2024 digital dispatch

FWIW, here’s how weekly digital ad spending (Facebook/Instagram, Google/YouTube) compares between the Trump and Biden campaigns year-to-date:

Despite no longer being in the race, Nikki Haley received 155,000 votes in Pennsylvania’s GOP presidential primary on Tuesday - bad news for Donald Trump’s chances in the must-win swing state. To make matters worse, the Biden campaign is launching new digital ads in the Keystone State to win over some of those Haley voters.

So, we get another year of TikTok?

A ban forcing the sale of TikTok passed Congress and was signed by President Biden this week. TikTok addicts shouldn’t fret yet - it appears that the popular app will remain active in the US through the November election at least since the bill included an extended deadline for a sale. Besides, the company will likely fight the new law in court on First Amendment grounds.

Here’s some good coverage of the status of the viral social video platform:

Platformer: How the TikTok ban could survive a court challenge
New York Times: Congress Passed a Bill That Could Ban TikTok. Now Comes the Hard Part.
WIRED: Can the First Amendment Save TikTok?

The vibes on TikTok last week:

Speaking of TikTok… here’s a look at 10 of the most-liked videos mentioning Trump on TikTok in the past week:

The vibes were fairly good for Donald Trump on TikTok this week. A viral video from @1tashyat featured a nice interaction between Trump and a young Republican who asked a question about national security. Several trending videos, including those from @dailymail and @aja__baa, focused on the man who self-immolated in front of Trump’s trial this week (but didn’t really link it to Trump).

Here were some of the most-liked videos mentioning Biden in the past week:

The vibes on TikTok were a little rough this week for President Biden in the wake of his signing of the TikTok bill (which is to be expected). @noahglenncarter, a young influencer, made a few viral videos breaking down the legislation and how politicians who supported it are “out of touch.” @men_world_ received loads of engagement on a video that implied the Trump admin was stronger on America’s adversaries than the Biden team, and @nbcnews picked up on a goofy spat between Biden and the nation of Papua New Guinea.

More from around the internet:

Are you having trouble keeping up with Trump’s criminal trial in New York? Brian Derrick and Glennis Meagher have a good breakdown of what’s happening in this week’s Vibes Only podcast. Listen on Apple or Spotify.

The Gateway Pundit, a powerful right-wing media site, is declaring bankruptcy after being ensnared in lawsuits for spreading election lies.

Twitter Trump was pretty wild… but now that he’s isolated himself over on Truth Social, Trump is apparently taking the anger and the conspiracy theories to new heights.

It appears that it might be impossible to turn off Meta’s new AI tool on Facebook and Instagram even if you try.

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