Trump short on promise to spend $100M of own cash

WASHINGTON— Donald Trump has repeatedly said he will spend $100 million or more of his own money on his presidential bid. Yet even with a fresh donation, he’d be $34 million short of that promise.

The Republican nominee told supporters at a New Hampshire rally Friday afternoon that he’d given another $10 million earlier in the day. That means his personal investment over the course of the primary and general elections would have grown to about $66 million.

The infusion comes as Democrat Hillary Clinton holds a striking cash advantage over Trump, new Federal Election Commission reports show. As of last week, Clinton and her Democratic partners had $153 million in the bank, more than double the resources of the Trump side.

Those same filings also show how big-money donors appear to have shifted their support to Republican super PACs focused on down-ballot races, suggesting a significant lastditch effort to protect Senate and House candidates against Clinton’s surge. Relatively little new money has come into outside groups supporting Trump.

And, at least in October, Trump appears to have lost the support of his biggest donor: himself.

Trump invested heavily throughout his GOP primary race. Then, during the general election, he slowed his personal contributions to about $2 million per month.

Trump’s giving has been tied to email appeals to his supporters, promising to “match” donations up to $2 million. Those emails stopped earlier this month, according to Tom Sather, senior director of research at the email data solutions firm Return Path. The firm tracks every email from political candidates.

His campaign resumed the “matching” solicitations on Friday. “I will TRIPLE MATCH any amount you can contribute today,” stated an 11 a.m. email to his supporters.

The new gift — not yet reflected in public documents — would represent the most Trump has put into his bid since the month of March, when he loaned his campaign $11.5 million. Trump later zeroed out all of his loans, converting them into contributions that cannot be repaid.

His personal investment shrinks when accounting for about $9 million in campaign cash that has returned to his family and businesses.

Trump’s Friday aid follows weeks where Clinton actually chipped in more than he did to cover political expenses. In the first 19 days of the month, Clinton offset $87,000 worth of campaign expenses while Trump covered about $33,000 of his. With files from the New York Times