Parties spend more than candidates

Nationally, political parties spent more money on advertising than the candidates themselves for the first time in modern history, according to a report conducted by university professor Kenneth Goldstein.

The Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee together spent $79.9 million on television ads in the campaign, while the Bush and Gore campaigns combined spent $67.1 million, the study said.

Goldstein said that the parties and the candidates probably paid even more for advertising during the campaign, since the estimates are conservative and based on spending in major markets.

According to the report, unregulated soft money raised by the parties paid for many of the media ads. Soft money consists of unregulated and unlimited party donations from corporations, labor unions, and wealthy individuals. By law, soft money is to be used only for party-building activities. The TV ads purchased by the Bush and Gore campaigns during the general election were funded exclusively with taxpayer dollars provided to the candidates, under a 1974 law, in exchange for their promises not to raise or spend money from other sources.

Though the parties spent substantial sums on television ads for the first time in the 1996 Clinton-Dole presidential contest, combined spending by the parties trailed spending by the candidates $48.8 million to $67.3 million, according to Competitive Media Reporting. One election cycle later, party soft money now buys the lion’s share of the ads for the presidential candidates.

The unprecedented study of political television advertising was conducted by Goldstein with the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law. The study is funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Using data from the Campaign Media Analysis Group to monitor political advertising in the nation’s top 75 media markets, reaching more than 80 percent of the U.S. population, Goldstein has been analyzing political advertising in real time throughout the 2000 campaign. Every political ad aired in these media markets is reviewed, quantified and coded along an extensive array of variables.

“Keep in mind, the figures on party spending are conservative,” says Goldstein. “At the campaign’s close, when the demand for television air time was greatest, the parties, but not the candidates, were charged premium rates by the broadcast stations. So the $79.9 million in spending on ads by the RNC and DNC, and the $13 million gap in party spending over candidate spending, likely understate party dominance in the 2000 presidential race. Another factor to consider is that the data used in our study is limited to the nation’s 75 largest media markets.”