WASHINGTON ― In an election where Republican House candidates were outraised and outspent, their party’s leader spent $77 million on his own campaign, even though his re-election was two years away. President Barack Obama did not start his re-election campaign until April 2011. Trump, in contrast, opened his re-election campaign account the day he was inaugurated in January 2017 and began staging rallies almost immediately. “Most presidents help raise money for candidates,” said Al Cardenas, once the state Republican Party chairman in Florida and a close ally of the Bush family. “I’m not surprised that he wouldn’t and he didn’t.”Trump did headline fundraisers for both the NRCC and the National Senatorial Republican Committee as well as help raise $325 million for the Republican National Committee, which helps Republican candidates up and down the ballot.

Source: Huffington Post February 02, 2019 00:00 UTC