--- title: Donald Trump Enjoys More than $23 Million in Free TV description: For his campaign, the constant exposure essentially translates to free money. canonical: https://time.com/4147550/donald-trump-free-media-television/ author: Tessa Berenson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-12-14T15:43:55.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:46:49.361Z article:section: Politics og:title: Here's How Much Free Publicity Donald Trump Gets og:description: "There’s really no precedent," an expert says og:url: https://time.com/4147550/donald-trump-free-media-television/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdb560e0293a3cb01/69887524cf40a87e8ac41107/trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 8000 og:image:height: 4500 og:image:alt: GOP Candidate Donald Trump Campaigns In South Carolina og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Here's How Much Free Publicity Donald Trump Gets twitter:description: "There’s really no precedent," an expert says twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdb560e0293a3cb01/69887524cf40a87e8ac41107/trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Here's How Much Free Publicity Donald Trump Gets > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement.  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Dec 14, 2015 3:43 PM UTC  Donald Trump speaks to the crowd at town hall meeting on Dec. 12, 2015 in Aiken, South Carolina. Donald Trump speaks to the crowd at town hall meeting on Dec. 12, 2015 in Aiken, South Carolina. Sean Rayford—Getty Images  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Dec 14, 2015 3:43 PM UTC First it was the summer of [Donald Trump](http://time.com/time-person-of-the-year-2015-runner-up-donald-trump/). Then it became fall, and now winter, and still Trump sits atop the Republican polls and dominates every news cycle. For his campaign, that constant exposure essentially translates to free money. That’s according to [a Bloomberg analysis](http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-12-14/how-trump-has-neutralized-super-pac-cash), which found Trump has enjoyed the equivalent of as much as $23.4 million in free media this year from ABC, NBC and CBS alone. Bloomberg arrived at this figure by looking at the total time Trump has spent on those networks and the average cost of a national ad. “There’s really no precedent for the amount of free media that Trump is able to get,” Richard Skinner, who studies money in politics for the Sunlight Foundation, told the website. “In part just because he’s a celebrity in a way we’ve really never seen before in a presidential candidate. His name ID is comparable to a sitting president. And this is his career. It’s what he’s been doing for the past several decades, which is generating lots and lots and lots of free media.” [Read more at Bloomberg](http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-12-14/how-trump-has-neutralized-super-pac-cash) **MORE** [Donald Trump, Person of the Year Runner-up](http://time.com/time-person-of-the-year-2015-runner-up-donald-trump/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4147550/donald-trump-free-media-television/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4147550/donald-trump-free-media-television/"},"headline":"Here's How Much Free Publicity Donald Trump Gets","datePublished":"2015-12-14T15:43:55.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:46:49.361Z","description":"\"There’s really no precedent,\" an expert says","url":"https://time.com/4147550/donald-trump-free-media-television/","keywords":["Donald Trump","2016 Election","Television"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdb560e0293a3cb01/69887524cf40a87e8ac41107/trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tessa Berenson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdb560e0293a3cb01/69887524cf40a87e8ac41107/trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"GOP Candidate Donald Trump Campaigns In South Carolina","caption":"GOP Candidate Donald Trump Campaigns In South Carolina","creditText":"Sean Rayford—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4147550/donald-trump-free-media-television/","name":"Here's How Much Free Publicity Donald Trump Gets"}}]}] ```