A new report from NBC News indicates desperation or maybe just laughable ambition on the part of the Trump campaign-GOP operation ahead of the elections.
The news outlet shared a rundown of benefits available for supporters who give or raise certain amounts in support of the Trump campaign, and at the $2.5 million level, among the claimed perks is a set of “Personalized Never Surrender High-Top Shoes.” Trump recently faced mockery for wheeling out a shoe-hawking operation, which this listed benefit appears to reference. It’s the only level that includes the shoes. “Never Surrender” in their description references a slogan that has circulated in connection to Donald Trump’s criminal cases, though he did literally “surrender” at one point for processing in his state case in Georgia alleging attempted election interference in 2020.
The Biden camp swamped the Trump campaign in fundraising across March, finishing tens of millions of dollars ahead after success including an event in New York City featuring Biden himself alongside former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. There was also a major surge in Biden campaign fundraising around the “State of the Union” address delivered last month by the president to Congress, which also spurred a round of relatively positive attention on the commander-in-chief and presumptive Democratic presidential pick.
Trump was expected to see his own fundraising surge this month with some reported initiatives, though high-dollar giving was perhaps unlikely to reverse Trump’s apparent struggles with everyday, smaller-dollar givers.
Numbers from the Biden and Trump campaigns generally refer to fundraising at both the main campaign operations and associated political party and fundraising organizations, the latter of which, though they’re under their own rules, avoid the sometimes intense limits on campaigns in the fundraising sphere.
Trump, meanwhile, is already Republicans’ presumptive pick for the presidential race this year, with large swathes of the party effectively falling in line no matter worries like his public and consistent support for January 6 participants.
