--- 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 is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  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"}}]}] ```