--- title: Nearly 430 People Are Already Running Against Trump in 2020 description: FEC records show the number of individuals who submit the form to run for president of the United States is skyrocketing. canonical: https://time.com/5481580/presidential-campaign-filings-skyrocket/ author: Abby Vesoulis article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-12-19T16:28:01.000Z article:modified_time: 2023-12-12T15:59:54.000Z article:section: Politics og:title: Nearly 430 People Are Already Running Against Trump in the 2020 Election og:description: The number of people who file with the FEC is skyrocketing og:url: https://time.com/5481580/presidential-campaign-filings-skyrocket/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt98a517a830b565f0/69893bb0096a9413eb6a3984/gettyimages-1044806530.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4176 og:image:height: 2349 og:image:alt: US-POLITICS-TRUMP og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Nearly 430 People Are Already Running Against Trump in the 2020 Election twitter:description: The number of people who file with the FEC is skyrocketing twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt98a517a830b565f0/69893bb0096a9413eb6a3984/gettyimages-1044806530.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Nearly 430 People Are Already Running Against Trump in the 2020 Election > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### 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. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=279c3afb-351c-41b5-be48-b6507412e005&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Trump’s Second Year in Office [Watch (HLS stream): Trump’s Second Year in Office](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/yrCnX8Wf.m3u8) (5:21)  _Published 2018-12-19. From tax cuts to the Mueller investigation, a look at the highs and lows of Trump’s second year in office._  by [Abby Vesoulis](https://time.com/author/abby-vesoulis/)  ## Abby Vesoulis Updated: Dec 12, 2023 3:59 PM UTCPublished: Dec 19, 2018 4:28 PM UTC From tax cuts to the Mueller investigation, a look at the highs and lows of Trump’s second year in office.  by [Abby Vesoulis](https://time.com/author/abby-vesoulis/)  ## Abby Vesoulis Updated: Dec 12, 2023 3:59 PM UTCPublished: Dec 19, 2018 4:28 PM UTC In the last five years, Michael Bickelmeyer has been a Domino’s Pizza driver, a Honey Baked Ham crew-member and a Holiday Inn bellhop, according to his [résumé.](http://nebula.wsimg.com/039c06786e423162873b3b33a065f8a6?AccessKeyId=FBE3186C2CC28ECE427E&disposition=0&alloworigin=1) But that’s not all — he was also a 2016 candidate for president of the United States. And he’s going to run again in 2020. Bickelmeyer, a 59-year-old Republican from Northeast Ohio is only one of 430 individuals who have filed a form stating their 2020 presidential candidacies to the Federal Election Commission, an agency tasked with enforcing campaign finance laws. With over 600 days left until Nov. 3, 2020, hundreds more are expected to follow suit. FEC records show the number of individuals who submit this form is skyrocketing in comparison to previous presidential cycles. For the 2000 presidential election, only 418 individuals declared their campaigns to the FEC, a mandatory step for individuals who raise or spend more than $5,000 on contributions and expenditures. For 2016, 1,777 did – a 325% increase over the past five presidential elections. To be sure, very few individuals who file the FEC form end up being considered serious candidates. Of the 1,777 candidates who reported their campaigns to the FEC in 2016, fewer than 130 reported spending any money at all on campaign [disbursements,](https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/making-disbursements/) such as for staff salaries, travel, and campaign advertising. Of those that did, only 51 candidates spent more than $20,000. Bickelmeyer, for example, reported less than [$6,000 in disbursement expenses ](https://www.fec.gov/data/candidates/president/?q=P00004861&election%5Fyear=2016&cycle=2016&election%5Ffull=true)and had just $10 on hand by the end of his 2016 campaign. President Donald Trump’s principal campaign committee, in comparison, spent more than [$300 million on disbursements](https://www.fec.gov/data/candidates/president/?election%5Fyear=2016&cycle=2016&election%5Ffull=true) for the 2016 election and finished with $7.6 million on hand. When reached by phone, Bickelmeyer told TIME he was too busy to discuss why he thought he was qualified for the job until the next calendar week. His three current jobs are exhausting, Bickelmeyer said, and he needs rest whenever he can get it. Experts say the ease of filing the documents online plays a role in the number of candidates who declare their campaign intentions with the FEC. “The internet makes it easier to file because you don’t have to write for the forms, and fill them out and mail them,” says Eli Noam, an economics and finance professor at Columbia with [expertise](https://www.iicom.org/images/iic/intermedia/Jan-2017/how-the-internet-got-donald-trump-elected.pdf) in internet policy issues. “You can just do this at 2 a.m. in the morning in your basement.” The hyper-visibility of President Donald Trump’s success as an unconventional candidate doesn’t hurt either. In fact, since 2016, celebrities such as [Kanye West,](http://fortune.com/2018/09/01/kanye-west-president-2024/) [Alec Baldwin,](https://www.bustle.com/p/is-alec-baldwin-running-in-2020-hes-talking-about-a-faceoff-with-president-trump-9374292) and [Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson](https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/politics/dwayne-johnson-the-rock-political-aspirations/index.html) have hinted they might be interested in running for president, as have business moguls [Mark Cuban](http://fortune.com/2018/06/05/mark-cuban-weighs-presidential-bid/) and former New York City Mayor [Michael Bloomberg.](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/17/us/politics/bloomberg-president-2020-democrat.html) Noam says the successes of non-political public figures also hinges on their abilities to use nontraditional forms of communication. In the past, you might have had to gain support of the GOP or the Democratic party in order to have a successful candidacy, but now, social media and similar tools can be used to garner supporters. “It enables people to bypass this filter of traditional politics which included accumulating experience, rising in the ranks and being filtered out by your peers,” Noam said. Dwayne Johnson said as much and more to [_Rolling Stone_](https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-features/dwayne-johnson-the-pain-and-the-passion-that-fuel-the-rock-630076/) earlier this year. “I think in a lot of people’s minds, what Trump has proved is that anybody can run for president,” he said. “And in a lot of people’s minds, what he’s also proved is that not everybody should run for president.” Certainly, not everyone who files this form thinks they can win. People have other motivations, like publicity or vanity, Noam said. But despite these potential factors, the increase is not necessarily a bad thing. “People get engaged and there’s greater openness,” he said. “What’s wrong with that?” ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] President Trump's second year in office gave the nation and the world a lot to talk about. From disavowing allies like Canada to cozying up with rival autocrats like Russia and North Korea Trump's foreign policy shook up the world. And at home he stoked crowds with Make America Great Again rallies that made it seem like his 2016 election campaign never ended. But for all the fanfare, Trump is ending his second year with approval ratings in the low 40s. Trump's term so far has been defined by a handful of victories, from his perspective. The tax reform bill was a major victory, it reduced corporate taxes. His crackdown on immigration at the border is also a major victory from his basis standpoint. But, overwhelmingly, it's been characterized by scandals and investigations. With the Russia collusion investigation peeking and his former lawyer going to prison, uncertainties are mounting for the Trump Administration. Both the special counsel and the southern district of New York are narrowing in on A handful of pretty major indictments that don't look great for the President. There's also been major indictments of his top staff, his top campaign staff, his national security advisor, his campaign chairman, his former foreign policy advisor. All of these people have been indicted and pled guilty. I would say [ LAUGH ] that the legal consensus is that the president is in considerable legal peril. However, Trump's big triumph in the form of tax cuts have brought a string of positive economic news. The country's been consistently adding jobs every month. The unemployment rate is down and wages are slowly rising. So we have the best employment numbers we've virtually ever had. Last week we announced that the US economy grew at 4. 1 % last quarter. Nobody thought that was possible. [ APPLAUSE ] And if the Democrats got in, that number would be 1. 2- Well, the soaring stock market that he's taken credit for has faltered. The DOW was actually 1, 000 points lower than when Trump signed the tax reform into law, one year ago. And turbulence continue to rain over the administration's second year with multiple high- level staff turnovers. [ MUSIC ] This is a very chaotic White House. The number of people who have left the White House in this last year, the number of vacancies that remain unfilled, it's unprecedented. An anonymous [ UNKNOWN ] was even published in the New York Times by a senior staff member claiming to be a part of the resistance in the Trump Administration. Dispate the tumul, Trunp has continued his outsider approach to politics And marked the year with major breaks in US policy taking meetings with Russian and North Korean leaders that gave many alongside both party lines pause. And he picked fights with US allies while tearing up previous agreements. There's a big question now of whether you make a deal with the United States if it will be undone with the next administration. And president Trump has shown that deals that unite state not only in science but helps to negotiate around nuclear deal and that president can just [ UNKNOWN ] can just step back, same thing with parent climate works, same thin with the transportation partnership You see these sort of the politicization of foreign policy in a way that we haven't seen in the past. I think world leaders now are in a position to wonder what ?. They can count on the United States for in the future. In Trump's second year, the administration doubled down on campaign promises and started a trade war with China imposing tariffs on $ 250 billion worth of Chinese goods and took an increasing hardline stance on border security. So 2018 was overwhelming characterized by The Trump administration's crackdown on a group of immigrant, and that group is asylum seekers. The Trump policy is beginning from very early, 2018, was laser focused on this population. And that begins with ending temporary protection status for certain nationalities, the Zero Tolerance Policy which led to the Separation of families at the border. The sending of troops to the border, 5800 troops to the U. S. border. Trump sees hardline immigration as a winning issue politically for him. But a voter backlash against Mr. Trump propelled the Democrats to win the house of representatives in the midterms. Though Republicans were able to increase their majority in the Senate. Trump's most lasting achievement for his administration and the Republican Party could be his to appointees on the Supreme Court and is conservative appointments to the Circuit Court since taking office Trump has named 29 conservative judges to federal circuit court. But as the Mueller probe continues and incoming democratic lawmakers gain the power to launch their own investigations, next year is expected to be just as turbulent as 2018. Trump's third year will be all about investigations. 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