Trump promises to spend big in early voting states

WASHINGTON, Dec. 29 (UPI) -- Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump announced Tuesday that he'll be making a big ad buy in early voting states -- his first series of ads in the 2016 presidential race.

Trump says he plans to focus on the early voting states of New Hampshire, Iowa and South Carolina. The announcement comes just five weeks before the Iowa caucus on Feb. 1.

Trump tweeted Tuesday morning that his campaign was "$35,000,000 under budget." While the Center for Public Integrity does confirm that Trump, nor any outside group supporting him, has yet to run a single TV ad, the latest filing with the Federal Election Commission on Sept.30, states that Trump's campaign ended the last filing period with $254,772 cash on hand. One-third of Trump's campaign coffers have been self-financed.

A second tweet says Trump has spent "almost nothing" on his presidential run. Trump's campaign spending has nearly kept pace with nearly $6 million in contributions and more than $5 million in operating expenditures. Thus the remaining balance of $254,772. Trump could be referring to his spending on advertising, which -- outside of "Make America Great Again" hats and other such merchandise -- has been minimal.

Trump also mocked fellow candidate and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush's big ad buys. The Center for Public Integrity puts Bush at the top of the list of presidential candidates from both parties in terms of number of TV ads. His total clocks in at 16,745.