As he mounts a disgraceful and anti-democratic challenge to the 2020 election results, Donald Trump’s campaign has been sending forceful emails to supporters, pleading for donations to fight the “illegal ballots” he claims were cast for Joe Biden, his soon-to-be successor. But the fundraising effort isn’t only supporting his long-shot legal battle: Never one to pass up an opportunity to grift, a majority of the money he’s bringing in was initially earmarked to pay off his campaign debts.
And now, the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman reported Tuesday, 60 percent of the new donations will go to a new political action committee called Save America, which will bankroll his personal political activities after he leaves the White House. “Small donors who give thinking they’re helping to defend the integrity of our election are in fact largely helping to finance Trump’s post-presidential political endeavors,” Brendan M. Fischer, an attorney at the watchdog Campaign Legal Center, told the Times.
According to Haberman, donations only go to the recount fund once they hit the $5,000 mark, meaning most of the money will go to the Republican National Committee and to Trump’s new PAC funding travel, polling, donations to other candidates, and other activities ostensibly related to politics. Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh defended the PAC, saying it was part of the president’s long-established plan to “support candidates and issues he cares about, such as combating voter fraud.”
Of course, there’s only one candidate Trump truly cares about—himself—and filtering the money through a PAC as opposed to a more narrowly defined recount fund could allow him to define the “issues” he spends money on a bit more loosely. “There is far more flexibility with how a candidate can use a leadership PAC than a recount account,” Fischer told Haberman.
In refusing to concede the election to Biden, Trump is obviously working to maintain the delusion that he has never lost anything in his life and that only a massive, anti-Trump conspiracy can explain his apparent defeat. But as my colleague Gabriel Sherman reported Monday, the Trump campaign’s debts—and now his PAC—give him a financial incentive to continue fighting the legitimacy of the results. Playing this sort of sleight of hand on the MAGA faithful is likely a preview of his post-presidential career. He traded on his office for political gain for the last four years, why stop now?
More Great Stories From Vanity Fair
— The 10 Moments When Trump Lost the 2020 Election
— Trump’s Plans to Barricade Himself in the Oval Office
— Joe Biden’s Campaign Manager Told the Political Future—And Was Right
— Republicans Are Standing by Trump, Even as the World Moves On
— A Vigil With Donald Trump’s Ghosts
— Kayleigh McEnany: White House Press Secretary and Donald Trump’s Election Cheerleader
— Cover Story: AOC’s Next Four Years
— From the Archive: Presidential Club Rules and Why Trump Will Be Left Out of the Fraternity
— Not a subscriber? Join Vanity Fair to receive full access to VF.com and the complete online archive now.