Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is not running anything near an orthodox presidential campaign. He claims that he has been “self-funding” his campaign. In reality, he really just took a loan out of his personal funds for it.
That may not work in the general election. Even back in June, Trump was complaining of money troubles. He sent an email to his followers saying he needed an “emergency” $100,000 for television spots.
He also has some strange spending habits. In May, the Trump campaign spent $55,000 at Barnes & Noble.
He actually has one piece of merchandise being sold by Barnes & Noble. There is a Donald Trump paper doll that you can get. Maybe, Trump was trying to drum up sales of that and of his books.
Twitter had some very hilarious ideas regarding what the Trump campaign may have been buying. Olivia Nuzzi from The Daily Beast reported on it, and these are some of the responses.
How many different Dilbert calendars are there?
— Alternative Fax (@daveblend) August 21, 2016
https://twitter.com/westernseaboard/status/767439102673231873
@darth Hopefully it was constitutions all around.
— Anil Das (@dasanil) August 21, 2016
@darth They bought Politics For Dummies for everyone in the campaign?
— McBarb ??? (@hawks_sox) August 21, 2016
@darth does barnes and noble carry trump steaks im just asking
— Seth Trueger (@MDaware) August 21, 2016
"The Art of the Deal is selling so well. The best sales. Look at Barnes and Noble in May. So good."
— Haight St Records (@HaightStRecords) August 21, 2016
Maybe The Donald needs to hold onto that campaign money a little tighter. In July, he raised $35.8 million. He said:
“It’s gonna be announced tomorrow or the next day: we’ve raised, we think, about $35.8 million. This is unheard of for Republicans, $35.8 million.”
As of June 30, Hillary Clinton has raised $600 million total throughout the campaign. At this point in the 2012 election, the then-Republican presidential nominee had raised $101 million during that July. Donald Trump has raised a total of $296 million throughout the campaign.
Donald Trump seems to think of money as a status symbol. He says this about “self-funding” his campaign:
“I’m self-funding. I’m putting up my own money. “It’s something I don’t know that I’m given proper credit for, but you know what, I feel better about it because nobody has me. I’m working for you.”
The Barnes & Noble spending mistake along with these things will hopefully lead to him losing in the general election.
This is not the only irresponsible spending he has done. He actually has been diverting some campaign funds to his own businesses.
Featured image by Mike Kalasnik via Flickr, available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.
