Ex-President Donald Trump “spent [about] $375,000 raised from his followers for rent at his financially troubled Manhattan skyscraper last year ― even though his political committees have no presence in the building,” a new HuffPost report explains. One prior aide of the former president, whose name wasn’t identified in the HuffPost report, called the set-up “a huge scam,” adding: “I can’t believe his base lets him get away with it.” HuffPost adds that when a New York City Trump Tower employee was “asked for permission to visit Trump’s political office recently, the employee told HuffPost that Save America and its related entities did not have offices there” — despite the large amount spent by the committee for the claimed purpose of renting space at the building.
Essentially, this whole arrangement provides a financial prop to the former president, who hasn’t exactly always been in the best times financially. Filings by Trump’s post-presidency political operation with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) reveal that, in 10 months of last year, the Make America Great Again political action committee (PAC) spent $37,541.67 a month on rent at the Trump-owned Manhattan property. The monthly amount is the same as monthly rent amounts that were spent by the Trump campaign for space at Trump Tower throughout the former president’s run for re-election, from around the middle of 2017 through the end of 2020, when Trump’s campaign efforts morphed into his PAC. Notably: the Trump campaign didn’t actually use the space much, either. The ex-aide for the former president who spoke with HuffPost said that Trump’s team “knew they couldn’t lose that money because the building is hurting so bad.”
According to that former Trump aide, the space is now just used to store campaign memorabilia, which could feasibly be placed elsewhere at much cheaper rates. Trump’s post-presidency political operations include the Make America Great Again PAC, which is what his campaign account became, and the Save America PAC, a fundamentally newer endeavor known as a leadership PAC, a type of organization that the FEC describes as “directly or indirectly established, financed, maintained or controlled by a candidate or an individual holding federal office” that is “not an authorized committee of the candidate or officeholder and is not affiliated with an authorized committee of a candidate or officeholder.” In other words: it’s an official Trump entity that’s not the campaign. There’s also a joint fundraising operation that sends donor cash to both entities. The rent that the Make America Great Again PAC paid to Trump’s business last year is more than the Save America PAC gave to Republican candidates in the same period.
"When people show you who they are, believe them the first time." Has Donald Trump not given us front row seats to who he really is? Let's do as the great Maya Angelou said and believe him.
— Citizens for Ethics (@CREWcrew) February 18, 2022
Interestingly, candidates for federal office and Republican political committees also spent more last year at Trump’s properties than his Save America PAC donated to Republican contenders for office during the same stretch of time. That Save America total is $350,500 — and Mar-a-Lago alone got $427,196 last year from conservative candidates for federal office and committees, HuffPost explains. Legally, the Save America committee (since it’s not a campaign operation) “can be used for virtually anything [Trump] wants, including paying his personal expenses or even providing himself a hefty salary,” as summarized by HuffPost — so it doesn’t particularly appear as though Trump is violating the law with the arrangement to provide rent payments to his own company for space that’s barely used for anything.
New ruling: Ex-Trump Org. CFO Allen Weisselberg can be questioned by lawyers from the D.C. attorney general's office, which has sued the company and Trump's 2017 Inaugural Committee. https://t.co/2uae16WRpY
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) February 18, 2022
