Electoral candidates for the 2024 presidential elections spent 47 million RON in the first two weeks of their campaigns, according to an Expert Forum report. The largest amount, 37 million RON, was spent by the Social Democratic Party (PSD), while independent candidate Mircea Geoană spent more than the Union to Save Romania (USR). The funds were primarily allocated for “various services” and online, radio, or television promotion.
Expert Forum analyzed the financial data published by electoral competitors from the presidential and parliamentary elections. The first two weeks of the presidential campaign and the first week of the parliamentary election campaign were analyzed.
PSD spent the most money in the presidential campaign
According to the data processed by Expert Forum, the Social Democratic Party leads the list of expenses made in the first two weeks of the presidential campaign. The PSD candidate is Marcel Ciolacu.
During this period, the Social Democrats registered invoices worth 37 million lei, while the rest of the competitors spent, together, almost 10 million lei. From this amount, PSD spent 12 million lei for propaganda in the mass media, 10 million lei for online propaganda and 11 million lei for clothing. The Social Democrats claim that, so far, they have financed their campaign from their own funds.
Online political advertising, for example, the promotion campaigns on the Facebook page of the parties, while promotion in the mass media involves, for example, the promotion on news sites.
According to the quoted report, in the same period PNL (which supports the candidate Nicolae Ciucă) registered invoices of 4.2 million lei, AUR (which supports the candidate George Simion) registered invoices of 1.87 million lei, and USR (which supports the candidate Elena Lasconi) registered invoices of 1.2 million lei.
The rest of the parties spent 1.1 million lei in the first two weeks of the presidential election campaign.
In general, the parties collaborate during the campaign for the presidential elections with the same firms they collaborate with in the parliamentary elections, the cited report shows. 33% of spending was reported for “miscellaneous services” such as clothing, and 58% of spending was billed for media and online advertising.
In terms of income, USR and PNL rely the most on subsidies received from the state, Expert Forum also points out (2 million lei in the case of USR and 750,000 lei in the case of PNL).
Mircea Geoană, the largest amount spent among the independent candidates
In the case of independent candidates, Mircea Geoană leads the list of expenditures, with 1.6 million lei. He reported, in the first two weeks of the electoral campaign, higher expenses than USR, for example.
Geoana reported income of 1.6 million lei for this period, of which 24,000 lei come from a donation, 1.5 million lei from several loans and 120,000 lei from own income.
The largest amount (1.4 million lei), according to the cited report, was allocated by Geoană to online promotion, to a company owned by the vice-president of the football team Gloria Buzău.
Cristian Diaconescu declared as income for this campaign the sum of 375,000 lei, obtained from a loan. Ana Birchall declared as income the amount of 200,000 lei, own funds.
PSD tops campaign expenditures for general election
The Social Democratic Party also leads in the top of campaign expenditures for parliamentary elections, according to the same Expert Forum report. The Social Democrats have invoiced 16.91 million lei so far. The most money was allocated to online promotion and mass media propaganda (11 million lei).
In the same period, PNL spent 5.3 million lei, AUR spent 2.1 million lei, and USR 2.1 million lei. Most of the money, also in the case of these parties, was allocated for promotion in the online environment and media propaganda.
During the campaign for the parliamentary elections, candidates from all parties contributed approximately 70 million lei. The largest amount – 30 million lei – comes from the more than 200 PSD candidates. The Liberals contributed 20 million lei to the PNL campaign, the AUR got 6.3 million lei from the candidates, and the USR received 3.2 million lei from the candidates.
“Some of the companies that received the most money have ties to the parties, being owned by party members themselves or people who borrowed from the parties at one time. Given that the expenses of the parties that receive more than 3% of the votes are reimbursed from the state budget, campaign financing becomes a form of supporting party companies or rewarding some people who finance the parties when needed”, says the Expert report Forum.