The election where the billionaire prominently campaigned for by the richest megabillionaire in the world won proves that money plays little role in politics.

elon poured a ton of money into strategic locations right at the end, such as running a fake lottery in PA. many attribute the outcome on the role he played.

may not be the most money, but it's the most effective use of money.

PA roads were littered with trump signs because of people being paid to litter our streets with them. for months.

people are, sadly, very easily influenced. companies wouldn't pour so much into advertising, in general, if it didn't have such an effective influence

Kamala raised $1.65 billion compared to Trump's $1.1 billion [0]. Not like it was a massive difference. Especially because that does not take into account super pacs, like Musks $200million in Pennsylvania.

[0] https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2024-11-15/trump-har...

Yeah but if you ask chatgpt:

"Absolutely, money does have a measurable impact on political outcomes"

https://www.investopedia.com/surprising-thing-billionaires-s...

https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/winning-vs-sp...

Maybe, but Trump spent over half a billion on his 2024 campaign. Are you suggesting the outcome would have been unchanged had he spent a "sane" amount like $50M total? Because I don't think so.

Furthermore, in a country with somewhat free media you would always expect populist candidates to outperform with a given budget, because their platform is much better aligned with media interest; mass media does not want boring budget plans or quaint reforms-- rage-bait sells way better and nets populists tons of "free" online presence.

For fun I did a non-scientific analysis of presidential candidates a while back, and found funding raised wasn't statistically significant https://thomashansen.xyz/blog/election-spending-isnt-statist...