Trump shattered Texas fundraising record
Former President Donald Trump raised a record-shattering $61.6 million in his re-election campaign just from individual donors in Texas, the final campaign finance reports on the 2020 campaign show.
Trump’s totals are more than four times what he raised in 2016 from individual donors in Texas and are nearly double the $32.7 million President Joe Biden raised in the state, according to Federal Election Commission records.
In 2016, Trump relied heavily on his own finances to cover his campaign expenses. But over the last four years, Trump has aggressively raised money from Americans. Trump put a particular focus on Texas, a state he made 19 stops in during his presidency, many of them to hold rallies and raise money for his re-election.
That fundraising advantage was predicted by Trump campaign officials in late 2020, who said Biden’s policies on climate change would open up donations from Texans worried about the future of oil and gas. Trump’s focus on Texas led to 19 visits to the state during his presidency, many of them to hold rallies and raise money for his re-election.
In the closing days of the campaign, Samantha Zager, the deputy national press secretary for the Trump campaign, said she wasn’t surprised at the flow of Texas money.
“Texans would never vote for Biden’s radical agenda, including a call to end the oil industry by 2025,” she said.
Where the money came from in Texas seems to back up that point. Trump raised more money from the Houston metro area than any other city except Los Angeles. According to an analysis for the Center for Responsive Politics, Trump raised almost $14 million just from the Houston region. In the Los Angeles area, Trump raised almost $16 million.
Those totals do not include donations from political action committees in Texas, many with ties to the oil and gas industry.
Trump carried Texas in 2020, winning with a 631,000-vote margin out of more than 11 million votes cast. Still, it was the state’s closest margin of victory for a Republican running for the White House since 1996.
Trump’s affinity for Texas was clear even in the final weeks of his presidency. His last official trip as president before leaving the White House was to Hidalgo County on the border. While he used the trip to celebrate sections of the partially completed border wall, he also talked up how well he did with voters along stretches of the border where he had wanted to build a wall. Trump only won 41 percent of the vote in Hidalgo County, but that was the best showing for a Republican in that county since President George W. Bush, a Texan, won 44 percent of the vote in 2004.
Trump reveled in winning other border counties, such as nearby Zapata, which hadn’t voted for a Republican in 100 years.
During his speech in Hidalgo County, Trump bragged that “not only did I win Texas in historic numbers, but I won border towns, which are largely Hispanic, and people were amazed to see that.”
Biden’s share of the vote, 46 percent, was the best for a Democratic presidential candidate since 1976.
While Biden was outraised in Texas, his $32.7 million from the state represents a record for Democrats. In 2012, then-President Barack Obama raised $23.1 million in the state.