Trump Spent $50 Million in Donor Money on Legal Bills Last Year: Report
Donald Trump’s PACs spent a staggering $50 million on the former president’s legal defense in 2023, according to a report from The New York Times.
According to two sources who spoke to the Times, the former president’s massive legal bills were paid out through funds from the Save America PAC and the Make America Great Again PAC, his two primary political action committees. The full details of the PAC spending will be made available Wednesday, the deadline for Federal Election Commission year-end campaign filings.
Given the multiple civil and criminal cases leveled against Trump in the last year, the mountain of legal bills is not necessarily a surprise. In August of last year, Save America revealed that it had burned through the majority of its cash-on-hand on Trump and his associates’ legal defenses. The Times reported at the time that Save America had requested a $60 million refund from another Trump-affiliated group to keep itself afloat.
According to the Times, 10 cents of every dollar donated to Trump’s campaign is being directed towards Save America, which in the last year has operated virtually exclusively as a legal slush fund for the former president.
Trump is raking in millions in donations fundraising off his various legal indictments. In the days after Trump’s New York indictment on charges related to his 2016 hush money payment to Stormy Daniels, the former president raised more than $7 million on the news.
Trump was not photographed when he was booked in New York, but it didn’t stop his campaign from hawking merchandise using a fake mugshot. When Trump did finally make history in August as the first American president to have his mugshot taken, the campaign was prepared with a slew of fundraising emails and campaign merch featuring the image. In December, he began offering scraps of the suit and tie he wore in the now infamous photo to convince fans to buy into his NFT trading card cash grab.
The influx and outflow converting donations to legal bills would normally be enough of a concern to send major donors and grassroots contributors running for the hills, but it’s having virtually no effect on Trump’s momentum toward securing the Republican 2024 nomination. The former president secured decisive victories in the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, and has all but crowned for his November rematch with Joe Biden.
More from Rolling Stone
Kristi Noem Warns of Possible Civil War Amid Border Standoff
Mike Johnson Denies Trump is 'Calling the Shots' on Border Deal
Best of Rolling Stone
