EGN NEWS DESK
Former President Donald J. Trump has spent greater than $100 million since leaving workplace, on legal professionals and different prices associated to warding off varied investigations, indictments and his coming prison trials, in keeping with a New York Times evaluate of federal information.
The exceptional sum implies that Mr. Trump has averaged greater than $90,000 a day in legal-related prices for greater than three years — none of it paid for along with his personal cash.
Instead, the previous president has relied nearly totally on donations made in an try and struggle the outcomes of the 2020 election.
Now, these accounts are almost drained, and Mr. Trump faces a alternative: start to pay his personal substantial authorized charges or discover one other technique to finance them.
November 2020 to Early 2021
Mr. Trump raised a staggering $254 million on-line from Nov. 4, 2020, the day after the election, to President Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20, 2021, as he urged supporters to gas an “election protection fund.”
The contributions got here so rapidly that on Nov. 9, Mr. Trump shaped a brand new political motion committee, Save America, to retailer all of the money.
Only a fraction of the cash, nevertheless, went towards recounts and different authorized challenges to the election. Some went to Mr. Trump’s legal professionals throughout his second impeachment, associated to the Jan. 6 riot.
But Mr. Trump banked a lot of the money.
Rest of 2021
Mr. Trump began to make use of the cash to fund his post-presidential political operation and what would ultimately grow to be his sprawling authorized groups. In February, Trump renamed his 2020 committee to “MAGA PAC.”
By the tip of 2021, Save America, which continued to herald new donations, held a considerable portion of Mr. Trump’s fund-raising: $105 million.
2022
Both Save America and MAGA PAC spent considerably in 2022 on authorized payments and different associated bills. The House held its impeachment hearings. The F.B.I. searched Mar-a-Lago for lacking categorized paperwork in August. Mr. Trump’s authorized charges rose.
Mr. Trump spent about $27.2 million on legal-related prices for the 12 months.
As Mr. Trump ready to announce his 2024 run late in 2022, he confronted a quandary: His PAC couldn’t instantly spend cash to elect him as president. So Save America transferred $60 million to a pro-Trump tremendous PAC known as MAGA Inc.
2023
Save America started 2023 with $18.3 million. But Mr. Trump’s authorized bills had been about to soar. He was first indicted in March 2023 in New York. Three different indictments adopted.
Mr. Trump spent near $60 million on authorized and investigation-related prices — which included his legal professionals, a document-production firm and an professional witness in Trump’s New York civil fraud case.
Early final 12 months, Mr. Trump made a change to deliver extra money into Save America, the PAC that was paying his authorized bills. At first, one cent of each greenback he raised on-line went to Save America; the remainder went to his 2024 marketing campaign. But with Save America in need of money to pay legal professionals, he elevated that to 10 %.
It was nonetheless not sufficient. By June 2023, Save America had lower than $4 million readily available. In an uncommon transfer, Mr. Trump requested his tremendous PAC for a refund of the $60 million he had given simply months earlier, in order that Save America might proceed paying for his authorized bills.
By the tip of 2023, greater than $42 million had been returned from his tremendous PAC to Save America.
2024
With his first trial looming — within the New York case associated to hush-money funds to a porn star in 2016 — Mr. Trump’s authorized prices continued to rise. He spent at the very least $9.7 million in January and February.
The greater than $100 million in authorized spending since leaving workplace doesn’t embody spending from Mr. Trump’s 2024 marketing campaign, which has not paid for his private authorized payments.
To cowl the continuing authorized prices, his tremendous PAC refunded an extra $10 million in January and February. But there’s now solely $7.75 million left to refund. Save America had lower than $4 million on the finish of February, when accounting for unpaid money owed.
The Trump crew has mentioned the Republican National Committee received’t pay his authorized payments. But his new shared fund-raising settlement with the party directs a portion of donations to his Save America PAC earlier than the party itself.
Still, the account paying Mr. Trump’s authorized payments will probably be out of cash by summer time on the present spending tempo.
Then, Mr. Trump must resolve: Whose cash will he use to pay his legal professionals?
Methodology
Data comes from filings made with the FEC since 2020 for: Trump’s 2020 marketing campaign committee (which was renamed Make America Great Again PAC); Trump’s 2024 marketing campaign committee; the management PAC Save America; the Make America Great Again Inc tremendous PAC; the joint fund-raising committees Trump Make America Great Again Committee and Trump Save America Joint Fundraising Committee; the fundraising platform WinRed.
Legal prices had been tallied from all expenditures matching the time period “authorized” and sure expenditures matching the phrases “doc” and “analysis,” which had been decided to be associated to ongoing authorized circumstances and investigations. The determine for 2024 consists of authorized money owed incurred by Save America in 2024, which had been excellent on the finish of February.
Yearly donations had been calculated on-line donations reported by WinRed for the 2020 and 2024 Trump campaigns, Trump-aligned management committees and Trump-controlled joint fund-raising committees.
