The Grifter-in-Chief is on a fundraising tear. In the days following the Capitol Riot, he famously raised $100M. For Donald Trump, it’s easier to fleece his diehard loyalists than it is to continue to rely on the real estate/licensing business. But recently, promoting conspiracy theories, dining with antisemites and White supremacists, encouraging Capitol rioters, and constantly promoting the Big Lie, has dampened major-donor enthusiasm. Undeterred, however, are the misguided and misled small donors. He relentlessly begs small donors to contribute. Some get three emails a day.
He apparently hopes that throwing his hat in the ring will keep competitors out, and make the faithful dig deep in their pockets and couch cushions. It’s also likely that he hopes to intimidate a Justice Department that has been reticent to charge a sitting or former president with crimes. He’s facing real legal challenges in Georgia for election tampering, in New York for fraudulent accounting, and federally for his role in the January 6th Capitol riots.
Upon his announcement, the Attorney General, to separate the DOJ from these investigations, appointed a Special Counsel who operates independently. And now, the Supreme Court has ordered him to finally give his tax returns to the congressional committee that has sought them for years. All told, a rough week for DJT.
Declaring his candidacy now has two other benefits: one, the new revenue stream that he hopes replaces the now moribund endorsement deals, and two, it keeps him in the public eye. If there’s one thing Donald Trump can’t stand, it’s being ignored.
He is flush with cash even as that windfall begins to look a lot less impressive because the current fundraising effort has proven to be much more expensive than previous ones. Bloomberg recently reported that for every dollar he raises, it costs him 91¢. According to the Federal Election Commission, he spent $22M to raise $24M in the third quarter. It’s high cost/low margin money.
He uses PAC’s (relatively transparent donor base) and super PAC’s (all “dark” money, which is to say it’s anybody’s guess who those donors are) to segregate the money raised.
As one would guess, there’s a complex suite of campaign coffers, PAC’s, and super PAC’s. The PAC’s—super and otherwise—cannot coordinate spending with a candidate.
Of course the FEC, chartered to regulate campaign cash among other things, is as impotent as a Nevada boxing commissioner. It’s a six-person panel—three from each party—where deadlock is a permanent condition.
As any good grifter would, it’s assumed Trump will use spend the money on himself. CNN: “If I were in his position, I’d give the money to a super PAC and have the super PAC spend it,” said one Republican election lawyer, who asked not to be identified because of his ongoing work with GOP political committees. “Even if the FEC were to find that it’s not permissible – which I don’t believe they will, but even if they did – they aren’t going to fine him millions of dollars,” the lawyer added.
The New York Times wrote that the “Trump family has begun to work not just with foreign nationals, but with foreign governments themselves. The Trumps have recently signed a $4 billion deal with a Saudi Arabian real estate company that is backed by the government of Oman. The Trumps are deeply tangled with the Saudis already, of course, hosting the LIV Golf tournaments backed by the Saudi government and—in Jared Kushner’s case—investing $2 billion of Saudi government funds, a deal that Saudi leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known as MBS, personally approved after the panel that screens investments advised against the deal.”
But really, it’s the grift that has my attention. When political money is raised, it is used to augment candidates who are less successful fundraisers. That’s what Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell does with his PAC. But not so with the Donald. Here’s a HuffPost headline from this cycle: “Trump Spending Just A Tiny Fraction Of McConnell’s Total On GOP Candidates,” and here’s one from Vanity Fair: “Donald Trump seems to be using Republican Candidates to Line His Own Pockets.”
If the media does as Ronald Reagan’s daughter, Patti Davis, and so many before her have advised, and ignore Donald Trump, he may not go away, but he won’t be above the fold or top-of-mind. That would be good for us.
There’s an obvious irony in suggesting we waste less attention on him in a column that is wasting attention on him. I’m doing it for two reasons. First, he’s burned out everyone except his base, which is not big enough to get him elected president again, and second because his prowess as a grifter needs to be underscored before all the dark-money makes him the political Voldemort—he who must not be named.
©2022 Jon Sinton
That sums it up, Jon, exquisitely. Unfortunately, it's reality not a made-for-tv disaster movie. Kevin is going for the Guinness record, it appears, of being punched in the face repeatedly. It may be averted, though, as one talking head wryly observed, if he agrees to donate his heart, lungs and kidneys to the insurrectionist cause.
Such a shame we spend any time on him. We just spent a lot on another grifter - Ye - as if he were important, too. The American. media celebrity machine just can't resist.