Kanye West spent nearly $12.5 million of his own money on his presidential campaign.
Kanye West
The 43-year-old rapper - who ran for office under the Birthday Party - self-funded the majority of his late-entry run for office, attracting just $2 million from outside contributors, and, having earned just 66,000 votes across the US, meant each tick in the ballot box cost an average of $200 each.
According to a report from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the majority of Kanye's $14,538,989 campaign funds paid for "ballot access", and he was left with $1.3 million at the end of the campaign.
$7.5 million went to ballot access, with $1.28 million of that paid to Atlas Strategy Group, but it seems the investment wasn't a great success because the 'Stronger' hitmaker only made it as a candidate in 12 states.
Other major costs included legal fees, Kanye 2020 apparel and production for online videos used to promote his campaign, though the rapper - who is going through a divorce from wife Kim Kardashian West - and his team opted against purchasing TV, radio or digital advertising, which many experts believed was a mistake.
A former Kanye campaign insider told People magazine: "I didn't see any Kanye ads, did you? ...If [West] had pushed and done a $10 million buy digitally, they could've actually made a difference in a few states.
"Typically, [television and digital ads] combine for about 60-70 percent of a campaign's budget — minimum."
Towards the end of the campaign, the 'Gold Digger' hitmaker added over $2.7 million of his own money to the funds, but the insider believes Kanye "overpaid on a lot of stuff".
According to the FEC report, Kanye shelled out $210,544 for a two-page advertisement in The New York Times and another $918,130 on more campaign apparel on Election Day.
The source noted: "He isn't versed enough politically.
"He figured that by doing it on his own, he could control his own media. But he has so much other stuff going on in his life that has nothing to do with politics that the distractions are there."
By contrast, new President Joe Biden raised over $1 billion for his campaign, while his predecessor, Donald Trump, raised more than $811 billion.
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