Since Marco Rubio dropped out of the presidential race, super PAC activity on the campaign trail has quieted from a raging river to a slow drip.
In the past 50 days of available data, Donald Trump had a one-week period where he endured nearly $11.5 million in negative spending from super PACs. Compare that to the the most recent week of available data, when a mere fraction of that attacked Trump. From March 14 to March 20, only $389,879 was spent against Trump. All but $10,000 of that money came from Our Principles PAC, which isn’t affiliated with any candidate and exists solely to attack Trump.
No other candidate was attacked by any money from the 15 largest super PACs in the same time frame. In fact, no super PAC affiliated with a candidate spent against any other. Super PACs affiliated with a candidate either spent no money at all or only spent money on supporting their candidate.
Just before Rubio dropped out, his super PAC, Conservative Solutions, switched its aim from Trump to John Kasich. But the attacks on both were too little, too late: Kasich won Ohio, Trump won Florida, and both beat Rubio everywhere else on March 15. It didn’t help Rubio that Ted Cruz’s super PACs started to spend more against Rubio than against Trump.
For negative commercials, the numbers are similar to what’s happening with super PACs. From March 14 to March 20, four new commercials were released opposing Trump: Three from Our Principles PAC, one from Club for Growth Action.
One commercial was released from the Trump campaign to oppose Cruz, called “Lying Ted.”
Overall, more than twice as many commercials have been released to oppose Trump than any other candidate since Jan. 31, 2016. In fact, more commercials have opposed Trump than every other candidate combined.
For yet another week, the Democratic side remains quiet. None of the biggest super PACs are spending on Bernie Sanders’s behalf, and Clinton’s doesn’t seem to feel a need to attack Sanders. Their respective campaigns are releasing commercials, but they aren’t going negative against one another.
Jason Russell is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
