Donald Trump likes to point out that, unlike everyone else running for president in 2016, he’s got the money to pay his own way to the Republican nomination.
New Hampshire supporters of the billionaire businessman appear to be taking him at his word.
Granite Staters donated less than $6,000 to Trump’s campaign in the last three months, according to the most recent campaign finance reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.
(Scroll down to see a breakdown of donations to candidates by town.)
Trump, who has led the Republican field in New Hampshire since he entered the race in June, took in less than $14,000 in contributions from the state in all of 2015.
In an election season that’s turned much of the conventional political wisdom upside down, that shouldn’t come as a surprise. After all, the Republican who’s raised the most money in New Hampshire – Ben Carson – trails Trump by an average of 30 points in the polls.
Carson still managed to raise the most in New Hampshire among GOP candidates in the fourth quarter, more than $37,000. He also had the most individual donors – 160. He pulled in a total of almost $81,000 in 2015, followed by Jeb Bush ($65,000), Marco Rubio ($64,000) and Ted Cruz ($62,000).
Carson aside, those numbers reflect the changing dynamics of the race below Trump. Contributions to Bush, the top fundraiser through September even as his campaign struggled, fell off by more than half from the previous quarter.
Meanwhile, Rubio and Cruz, whose standing in the polls has been on the rise the past several months, saw a significant uptick in donations towards the end of 2015. Both candidates raised more than $30,000 from October through December.
So did John Kasich. He brought in $35,000, second only to Carson during the fourth quarter.
On the Democratic side, the story remains the small-donor support for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
From October through December, more than 657 Granite Staters made donations to Sanders – more than the number of contributors to all the Republican candidates combined.
Sanders raised almost $111,000 in the quarter, with an average donation of $57.13.
Hillary Clinton raised a little more than $64,000 from 184 New Hampshire supporters in the fourth quarter.
Sanders, who has a solid lead in the polls a week before New Hampshire voters go to the polls, trails Clinton in overall fundraising. Yet since November, he has outspent the former Secretary of State on television advertising in the local broadcast market by roughly $2.5 million.
Map: 4th Quarter Donations by Town
