Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump are in the final sprint of spending on television advertising, which has been vastly lower than in previous elections.
This election year has been an interesting anomaly. Outside groups have spent far less on the presidential election this year than they did in 2012. Travis Ridout, a professor of government at Washington State University and co-director of the Wesleyan Media Project, noted that swing states were blanketed in ads four years ago.
“The groups that were investing the millions upon millions in ads in highly saturated media markets just weren’t happy with the returns they were getting,” he said.