Friends Don’t Let Friends Give to Trump’s ‘Election Defense Fund’
Remind your MAGA pals how Trump spent the last one.
THERE’S NOT A LOT WE CAN SAY FOR SURE about what will happen Tuesday. But one thing we do know is the playbook Donald Trump will run if the presidential race is too close to call Tuesday night.
As in 2020, he’ll declare himself the victor. As in 2020, he’ll swear Democrats are trying to steal his victory in the dead of night. And as in 2020, he’ll bury his supporters in a barrage of hair-on-fire, Stop the Steal fundraising pitches, telling them their last-minute donations are the only thing standing between the country and the Kamalabyss.
In a just world, however, the similarities with 2020 would end there. In a just world, Trump’s pleas for post-election cash would fall on deaf ears, because his supporters would remember where the donations they sent to save the 2020 election actually ended up.
In the weeks that followed that election, Trump’s campaign sent out hundreds of solicitations to his “Official Election Defense Fund,” carrying on long after it was clear Biden had locked up the win.
These efforts were eye-wateringly successful, pulling in more than $250 million for the campaign—surely a sufficient sum to enable the Official Election Defense Fund to uncover the Democrats’ rampant fraud.
There were only two problems: There was no rampant fraud, and there wasn’t any Official Election Defense Fund. Instead, Team Trump just spent that money like any other bucket of campaign cash.
That’s not to say none of it was used for election defense. Some went to critical tasks, like funding the rally on the National Mall on January 6th. The bulk, however, was eventually rolled into Trump’s post-election super PAC, MAGA Inc. From there, it was primarily used for a specific purpose: bankrolling Trump and his allies’ personal legal bills.
The small-dollar donors who poured money into Trump’s coffers in late 2020 thought they were helping to overturn a great crime against democracy. Instead, they were just ensuring that their billionaire hero could fight his sexual assault cases, his hush-money cases, his classified-documents cases, and his election fraud cases without placing any strain on his billionaire lifestyle. Many may have been just fine with that; willing to give money to Trump for whatever purpose he needs. But all of them—whether they were comfortable with the outcome or not—were duped.
So here is my modest suggestion. Perhaps you’re a Trump hater with Trump supporters in your life. Perhaps this has caused tension and fights, or perhaps, in the interest of domestic tranquility, you’ve mostly kept your opinions to yourself (nothing wrong with that!).
At this late date, nobody’s changing anybody’s mind about whether Donald Trump is an angel or a demon. But here’s a place you might make some headway with Grandpa MAGA: If Trump comes knocking later this week asking for help protecting the integrity of our elections, beseech him to understand exactly where the money is going before he opens his checkbook.
Remind him how that money was actually spent last time around. Remind him Trump’s handpicked Republican National Committee has already raised and spent vast sums this cycle on “election integrity” efforts—so much so that they’ve turned to Elon Musk for traditional committee tasks like knocking on swing-state doors. Remind them the Trump campaign itself still has hundreds of millions of dollars on hand. Any Stop the Steal 2.0 effort isn’t going to founder for lack of scratch.
Your Trump-supporting friend or relative worked hard for their money. Don’t let them end up lining the pockets of America’s biggest fraudster. Donald Trump’s a wealthy man: This time, let him pay for his lawyers himself.