Trump’s Fundraising Agreement With RNC Allows Donations To Cover His Legal Bills Despite Concern He’s Using Party As A ‘Piggy Bank’

Former President Donald Trump’s new joint fundraising agreement with the Republican National Committee (RNC) allows donations to the party to be funneled to his campaign and PAC to cover his legal expenses.

Under the arrangement, Republican donors will see a portion of their money go toward helping Trump pay off his staggering legal bills before they are used for the national and state parties during the election season.

The details of the joint fundraising agreement were mentioned in the fine print of an April 6 fundraiser invite. 

This invitation mentions that donations to the joint fundraising committee, the Trump 47 Committee, will initially be used to give the maximum amount allowed under Federal Election Commission (FEC) guidelines to the Trump campaign. 

The remaining money will go toward the maximum donation to the Save America PAC, and any money left will be granted to the RNC and state political parties.

“Save America also covers a very active and robust post-Presidency office and other various expenses not related to fighting the illegal witch-hunts perpetrated by Crooked Joe Biden,” Trump campaign communications director Steven Cheung declared in a statement. 

“The Trump campaign, the RNC, and state GOP parties ultimately receive the overwhelming majority of funds raised through the Trump 47 Committee,” Cheung added. 

In 2023, the former president’s super PACs spent $50 million in donor funds on legal expenses after being criminally indicted for trying to overturn the 2020 election and mishandling classified documents. He is also facing defamation and civil fraud cases in civil courts.

Save America nearly went broke last year due to the spike in legal fees.

It is typical for presidential candidates to organize a joint fundraising agreement with the national party, allowing them to raise higher amounts for the general election.

However, some RNC members shared concerns that party funds would be used to cover Trump’s legal bills, and they sought a resolution to block the use of party money for that purpose.

However, after the former president’s allies, including his daughter-in-law Lara Trump, officially took over the RNC, they gave up on the effort.

Mississippi’s national committeeman Henry Barbour, son of the previous RNC Chairman Haley Barbour, confirmed that the resolution he drafted to block funds going to Trump’s legal defense is “dead.”

Barbour said he only received co-sponsors from eight of the ten necessary states to bring the resolution to a vote.

In mid-March, dozens of RNC staffers were fired or asked to reapply for their jobs. New chairman Michael Whatley made changes to the organization’s data and political operations, now led by the former president’s allies.

Election filings made public on March 20 showed Trump’s 2024 campaign brought in $10.9 million in February, while his joint fundraising committee raised almost $11 million. His operation, in total, had about $42 million in cash on hand when entering March.

Those figures fell far behind Biden’s campaign operation, which raised nearly $53 million in February, providing it with $155 million in cash entering March.

“If Donald Trump put up these kinds of numbers on The Apprentice, he’d fire himself,” Biden campaign communications director Michael Tyler mentioned in a statement. “But here’s why he ain’t got it: his extreme, toxic agenda of banning abortion, slashing Social Security, and promoting political violence is repelling donors and doing exactly ‘nothing’ to earn support from the voters who will decide this election.”

On March 24, the former RNC chair Ronna McDaniel told Kristen Welker during a Meet the Press interview that it was okay to use donations to pay Trump’s legal bills, as long as “donors know that that’s what they’re doing.” 

“It is in the waterfall of it,” she stated. “It is [Trump PAC] Save America before the RNC.”

“What I also think that that means is that the campaigns, or the RNC, is being truthful when they say they’re not going to pay the legal bills, and it is going to run through the Save America PAC,” McDaniel continued.

“But ultimately, these donations are going first to pay [Trump’s] legal bills,” Welker mentioned. “People who may be struggling, sometimes, to make ends meet. 

“Is there not an ethical challenge with that,” she asked the former RNC chair.

“If they feel strongly to support his legal bills, then they have very right to do so,” McDaniel claimed.

“And I think he’s being very open that they’re helping with his legal bills,” she went on to say.

In February, former GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley warned that Trump could use the committee as a “piggy bank” to pay for his legal fees.

Haley worried aloud that if the RNC focused on paying these expenses, it would no longer focus on funding House and Senate elections for Republican candidates.

She noted that Trump spent “$50 million worth of campaign contributions towards his personal court cases.”