Michael Medved

Can $100M buy the presidency?

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks in Urbandale, Iowa. Scott Walker and Rick Perry entered the 2016 presidential race with a combined 18 years of experience as governors. They exited the Republican primary, the first candidates to do so, with negligible support from voters and dwindling bank accounts. So far, Trump has been the biggest beneficiary of the public's demand for an outsider. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall, File)

Donald Trump’s decision to spend up to $100 million of his own money for his campaign shows desperation, not strength.

Self-funded billionaire candidates have a consistent record of failure in our nation, no matter how much they spend.

In 1992, Ross Perot blew $63 million &#8212 $107 million in today’s dollars &#8212 and did not win a single electoral vote.

In 1998, Democrat Al Chechi, who became known as “Al Checkbook,” was running for California governor and invested $58 million in today’s dollars to win just 12 percent of primary voters.

Republican Meg Whitman put a record-breaking $144 million into her 2010 California gubernatorial race and lost in a landslide. Mitt Romney’s first race for president cost him $57 million in 2008, but didn’t even win the nomination; four years later, he became GOP nominee without spending any of his own money.

Trump’s determination to try to buy the presidency with his own funds isn’t a demonstration of seriousness, but a sign of his limitations as a candidate.