Kamala Harris spent well over $1 billion in her abbreviated 107-day presidential campaign two years ago, a huge sum. But on Election Day, the sitting vice president found her image was underwater. According to exit polls, her favorables were at 46 percent and her unfavorables were at 52 percent, virtually the same as Donald Trump’s 46 percent to 53 percent.

She lost all seven competitive presidential states, though Democratic candidates won four out of the five Senate races in those same states. “Democrats do not have a money problem; it’s a strategy problem,” wrote the author of the Democratic National Committee’s autopsy report in an unofficial version of his own.

Big Democratic donors and the media were left wondering, “Where did all the money go?”

The better question for Democrats and Republicans going forward might be, “Is big money no longer the big determinant in major races, if it ever was?” Harris’ epic fail was seen by many as a one-off thanks to the Democrats’ nomination chaos. Instead, it seems to have been a precursor to what we have seen in a number of key primaries in the last few weeks.

From Michigan to Minnesota to Texas, we’ve seen establishment campaigns with overwhelming money advantages in advertising spending come up short. The first of these was in Michigan, where Abdul El-Sayed won the Democratic Senate primary in a squeaker against Rep. Haley Stevens by roughly 1 percentage point.

When looking at what was spent on advertising for both sides, including the campaign and spending done on behalf of each candidate, there is a significant story. Advertising........

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