By Jason Lange and Grant Smith
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s re-election coffers shrank in September as he fell behind Democratic challenger Joe Biden in the campaign’s money race, putting him at a disadvantage in the final weeks before the Nov. 3 election.
In a financial disclosure filed on Tuesday night with the Federal Election Commission, the Trump campaign said it had about $63 million in the bank at the end of September after spending about $139 million that month.
A month earlier, the Trump campaign reported having $121 million in cash.
Biden’s campaign has yet to report its cash holdings at the close of September. But the former vice president’s campaign said this month that together with the Democratic Party, it had $432 million in the bank.
Trump and his Republican Party had just $251 million in the bank, his campaign manager said this month.
Biden has held a significant lead over Trump in national polls for months, although Reuters/Ipsos polling shows a somewhat closer race in the battleground states likely to decide the winner.
Trump has fallen far behind the Democrat in recent months at fundraising and spending. Trump spent less than $56 million on television and radio advertising in September, compared with nearly $148 million by Biden, according to Advertising Analytics LLC, a market research company.
Including online ads, the president’s campaign spent at least $91 million on advertising in September, according to the disclosures filed on Tuesday.
(Reporting by Jason Lange and Grant Smith; Editing by Sandra Maler, Peter Cooney and Gerry Doyle)
