Vlaams Belang Leads in Ad Spending on Meta During Last Month of Campaign
In the period from May 5th to June 3rd, the far-right Vlaams Belang party has emerged as the top spender on Meta’s social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp) for sponsoring content. This information comes from the advertising library of the American company.
Taking into account sponsored pages with over 4,000 euros spent during this period, the Flemish far-right party has spent 449,757 euros. The page of its president, Tom Van Grieken, received more support than the party itself, with 257,795 euros and 156,885 euros spent respectively.
Following Vlaams Belang, the Flemish Christian democratic party CD&V showed high activity in the last month of the campaign, spending 246,757 euros on the party page and a total of 371,027 euros when considering sponsored pages with over 4,000 euros.
Behind these two parties, we find the Greens of Groen (251,087 euros for publications over 4,000 euros), the Belgian Labour Party PTB-PVDA (230,953 euros), and the Flemish socialist party Vooruit (203,736 euros). The Flemish nationalist party N-VA was notably less spendthrift during this period, with 151,860 euros, along with the liberals of Open VLD, the lowest-spending Flemish party with 151,752 euros.
Overall, over 2.2 million euros were spent in Flanders, 543,000 euros in Wallonia, and 286,000 euros in Brussels for « advertisements related to social, electoral, or political issues. » The top French-speaking party, Les Engagés (formerly the Humanist Democratic CDH), spent 115,352 euros, placing them behind the lowest-spending Flemish party. They were followed by the socialist party PS (87,059 euros), the liberal party MR (81,473 euros), the independent federalist democratic party DéFI (26,204 euros), and Ecolo (17,105 euros).
The PTB showed minimal spending in the south of the country, with 18,137 euros for the « PTB » page and 5,387 euros for the French-speaking page of its president, Raoul Hedebouw. Additionally, three small parties also supported pages with over 4,000 euros: Voor U (37,281 euros), Viva Palestina through the page of its list leader Dyab Abou Jahjah (7,355 euros), and the French-speaking far-right party Chez Nous (4,353 euros).