The Trump campaign is burning through its finances and isn't raising enough money to make up for it
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- President Donald Trump's campaign started October with $63.1 million in its war chest, new filings with the Federal Election Commission show.
- That's nearly three times less than the $177.3 million Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden had left in campaign funds at the same time, according to the filings.
- The Trump campaign has also had issues with fundraising recently. Last weekend the president cut short campaigning time to attend a prominent fundraising event in California, which ultimately got him just $11 million, CNN reported.
- GOP and Trump advisors told Business Insider earlier this month that the president's campaign doesn't "have enough money to close out the race."
- Election Day is in less than two weeks.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
President Donald Trump's campaign is looking strapped for money, according to new filings submitted to the Federal Election Commission on Tuesday.
According to the filings, the Trump campaign started October with $63.1 million remaining — nearly three times less than the $177.3 million Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden reported at the same time.
The disclosures showed that the Trump campaign had burned through more money than it took in last month. The campaign account responsible for advertising is also running dry, having spent more than $91 million in September.
The Trump campaign has in recent weeks cut television ads from several key states, including those he had hoped to flip in 2020, like Minnesota and New Hampshire, The New York Times reported. Meanwhile, the Biden campaign has ramped up coverage in swing states including Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
On top of his dwindling war chest, Trump has also been struggling with fundraising. According to CNN, the president cut short his campaigning time last weekend to fly to California for a fundraising event — which ultimately brought in just $11 million.
The bleak numbers offer a stark contrast to how much the president's campaign had in June, when Biden and the Democratic Party were nearly $187 million behind Trump and Republican National Committee.
The new filings followed widespread reports that Trump's former campaign manager, Brad Parscale, had badly miscalculated the campaign's budget this summer, banking on a $200 million cash surge for October that never came.
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A GOP source close to the president told Business Insider earlier this month that the president's reelection campaign would have been broke by the first week of October if Trump's advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner had not demoted Parscale in July.
"They don't have enough money to close out the race," the source said.
"There's been a tightening of the belt," another Trump advisor told Business Insider. "They recognized pretty quickly there wasn't going to be enough dough."
Trump has denied that reports of his campaign being strapped for cash, and said that if that were the case, he would finance the campaign personally.
"I keep reading Fake News stories that my campaign is running low on money. Not true, & if it were so, I would put up money myself," he tweeted on October 13.
In a Tuesday rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, the president addressed reports of his fundraising issue, saying that he "could be the king of all fundraisers," but that he did not want to "owe" large donors, according to The New York Times.
In response to the release of the new FEC filings, Rufus Gifford, who is Biden's deputy campaign manager, tweeted on Tuesday: "Remember when Trump said he would fund his own campaign if he needed to? Well ... He needs to."
Business Insider has reached out to the Trump campaign for further comment.
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- Trump calls a reporter asking him a question 'a criminal' for not reporting on the Hunter Biden allegations
- Melania Trump has a lingering cough after her COVID-19 diagnosis and will skip a campaign event for the president in Pennsylvania
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