Donald Trump has been fundraising like crazy for his re-election campaign, having filed his papers the day he was inaugurated for his first term. But there’s quite possibly an odd reason for his incessant begging for funds: According to Reuters, he’s using the money to pay for his defense team in the Russia scandal.
Reuters spoke to two people who are familiar with the situation, but they were unable to determine how much has already been spent on legal fees. Federal election laws allow candidates to spend private campaign donations on legal matters, but up until now, the legal matters in question dealt with routine and mundane things such as compliance requirements and ballot access issues.
Trump may well become the first president in the modern campaign finance era to use his donations to pay for a criminal defense in addition to routine legal matters. One of the biggest reasons that candidates shifted largely from public financing to private financing for their election campaigns is so they have greater flexibility in how they spend that money. That helps to give Trump greater latitude to spend donations on his own legal defense. Furthermore, since the Russia scandal is something that may not have existed had he not been elected, Trump and his family may well be legally free to spend their donors’ dollars on Russia.
His campaign organization currently has nearly $12 million. When Reuters asked Trump’s lead attorney how the bills were getting paid, he snapped, “That’s none of your business.”
Trump spent a large chunk of his campaign funding on his own properties during the 2016 election cycle, and has been spending government money at some of those same properties, lining his pockets with public dollars. His campaign has paid one law firm—Jones Day—almost $4 million, some of which probably did go to help with the Russia probe. Jones Day has also responded to inquiries related to Russia, including sending documents to Congress on the campaign’s behalf.
Here’s the sad thing: His donors, whether they know where their money is going or not, would probably cheer their chance to help Trump defeat the liberal conspiracy that is the Russia probe. They think they’re helping him get re-elected in 2020, so they think they’re helping him defeat the great deep-state witch hunt.
Featured image via Drew Angerer/Getty Images
