The winners' circle
The same question often emerges in the lead-up to an election: does spending more money actually equal more votes?
An exhaustive analysis is probably best left to political pundits or prospective PhD students, but even a simple examination of the 2020 House elections from OpenSecrets reveals that, among the 434 House seats contested, a mere 52 saw victory for the candidate with leaner campaign expenses. Indeed, in the last 4 cycles, House candidates who spent more money went to win their races 91% of the time.
Hey big spenders
Party leaders and top deputies generally spent the heftiest sums, often transferring large portions to party coffers — and in some cases lead to some lopsided contests.
While Republican chief whip and current Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy beat Democrat Kim Mangone to California’s 23rd District, he did so at the expense of $23.2m — some $21.6m more than his opponent. Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi, the twice-serving House speaker who preceded McCarthy, forked out nearly $19m more in the congressional race than runner-up Shahid Buttar — a self-described “constitutional lawyer, artist, writer, DJ & MC” — who spent just $1.6m on his campaign.
At least in 2020, more profligate politicians had the upper hand — even high profile candidates splashed masses of cash to get elected. Despite Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (or AOC) being the member of congress (or MOC) with the most Twitter followers, the youngest woman to serve in congress still spent some $5.2m more than her rival during her $16m campaign. And, notwithstanding a controversial court case just a year later, provocative representative Matt Gaetz claimed victory with a $4.4m campaign, spending some $2.5m more than his contender — a similar margin to that which saw Greg Pence win his race by, brother to another well-known Indiana legislator, who spent $2.7m in total.
Even so, being a familiar face paid dividends at the polls. Don Young, the Alaskan politician who was the longest-serving Republican in congressional history before he passed away in 2022, won the 2020 election while spending $3.3m less than his opponent. When you’ve been in congress for 49 years, you can maybe cut back on a few TV ads. It’s 85 year-old Maxine Waters, though, who most efficiently reaped ballots on a (relative) budget: serving California since 1991, Waters dished out ~$7.9m less than her opponent in 2020 to keep her well-worn seat.
Clearly, having deep pockets can only take you so far — Mike Bloomberg poured more than $1 billion into his primary campaign — but it certainly won't hurt your chances.
