Pro-Trump super PAC plans $100M push in key swing states

A pro-Donald Trump super PAC says it will spend $100 million over the summer for advertising in a handful of key swing states it says expand the former president’s path to victory.

The plan was outlined in a five-page memo sent Tuesday to donors of MAGA Inc., a  top Trump-backing super PAC that has spent $130 million since the start of the election cycle, including millions of dollars for Trump legal bills.

“We are under no illusion it will be easy, or fair — but thankfully, President Trump is well positioned to win as long as we all continue doing our part,” wrote group CEO Taylor Budowich in the memo, which was first reported by the New York Times.  “We have conserved resources for this moment, and MAGA Inc. will continue to put every dollar we raise straight into ensuring President Trump wins.”

The group, which says it will report raising $70 million in May alone, is centering its summer investment strategy largely on four states: Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada.

“Democrats realize their money advantage only matters if the electoral map is broad. They need to both solidify the Blue Wall states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, while keeping President Trump defensive in the Sun Belt states of Georgia, Arizona, North Carolina and Nevada,” Budowich wrote. 

Biden’s campaign and aligned committees are coming off of their own six-week $30 million swing state TV campaign. Two pro-Biden super PACs are also planning their own $50 million ad blitz, according to the Washington Post. The ads will be focused on Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. 

The Biden campaign did not return a request for comment. 

Trump and Republicans have long acknowledged they will be at a money disadvantage during the 2024 election cycle, but they received a wave of cash on the heels of Trump last week being found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a $130,000 payment made to an adult film star during the 2016 election.

Trump’s campaign says it will report raising $300 million in May, by far its biggest one month haul, including $53 million in the 24 hours after the verdict. Those numbers can not yet be independently verified due to lags in campaign finance reporting. 

Budowich, though, said his group’s ads will not necessarily focus on Trump’s court battles.

“Joe Biden and the Democrats wanted a conviction, and they got it, for now,” he wrote. “However, the fundamental political realities driving voter motivation remain unchanged: voters are pessimistic about America’s future, large majorities believe the country has gotten worse on a number of critical issues, and President Trump’s favorability and job approval has actually increased this year, while those same measures have gotten worse for Joe Biden.”

A wave of post-verdict polling generally showed majorities do agree with the verdict against Trump, but overall the political landscape was generally unchanged by the historic ruling. 

In its memo, MAGA Inc. said it views winning Pennsylvania as “the ballgame.” The group has already spent nearly $11 million in the state, and most public polling has had the race very tight. During Pennsylvania’s April primary, protest votes received attention with 163,000 Republican voters picking former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who had already dropped out of the race. That was 37,000 more protest votes than Democrats gave Biden.

Georgia is historically a state that has not been kind to Trump.

In 2016, he won the state by smaller margins than other recent GOP nominees John McCain and Mitt Romney, and in 2020, he lost the state. But Trump has consistently been up in the state by 4-5 points in 2024, according to most public polling — numbers MAGA, Inc. says reflect its own internal polling.

“Georgia’s 16 electoral votes present the best gateway to the White House for President Trump,” read the memo.

The group also has an “Out West” portion of their spending plan that will largely focus on Arizona and Nevada, with a focus on “harder to reach voters.”

Among MAGA, Inc.’s largest expenses to date is $60 million paid over 14 installments to Save America, another Trump-aligned super PAC that has been used to cover many of Trump’s growing legal bills. 

By comparison, it has spent roughly $3 million on polling and $1.9 million on fundraising expenses, according to campaign finance reports.