The RNC Is The New Trump Grift

With Trump’s takeover of the Republican National Committee, any dollars that it raises from donors will likely wind up in his pockets.

Donald Trump in 2020, when the RNC raised a record sum. How times have changed. Photo courtesy of Politico.

Does this sound familiar? Trump puts family members and trusted cronies in charge of an organization, then uses it to grift millions of dollars from any suckers they can swindle.

That could describe Trump charities, Trump University, Trump’s Super PAC or even the Trump Organization itself. But now he’s set his sights on a new target: The Republican National Committee.

The RNC just endured a terrible year. Fundraising has been abysmal and it has only $8 million left in its coffers. Meanwhile, Trump’s PAC covered some $50 million in Trump’s legal fees. It’s no wonder there isn’t much money left to squeeze out.

But with huge civil judgments against him and mounting legal bills from defending numerous criminal and civil cases, Trump is eyeing the RNC as his latest cash cow. And a number of events are converging this week that will make a money grab even more tempting and possible for him.

In today’s piece, I’ll review those developments and how they will render Republican national campaign funds nearly irresistible to a grifter like Trump who is in deep financial trouble. I’ll also discuss how he’s already laid plans for how to grab the money for himself, and what that could mean for Republican campaigns across the country.

Shake-up at the RNC

The current RNC Chair, Ronna Romney McDaniel, will resign this week. Apart from making her drop the Romney part of her name, Trump is now forcing her to step down from her position. He has not always seen eye to eye with McDaniel, especially during the debates and early primary campaigns that Trump essentially did not participate in. He was particularly off-put when she declared that the RNC would stop covering his legal fees after he declared his candidacy for president out of sense of fairness to other contenders.

McDaniel oversaw one of the worst fundraising years for the RNC on record, certainly the worst in a decade, raising only $87.2 million. This is quite low compared to the DNC, which raised some $30 million more. McDaniel might be excused for the poor result, given the constant dysfunction in the GOP-led House, the chilly relationship between GOP Senate leadership and the rest of the party, and the fact Trump himself has been occupying the field when it comes to fundraising.

Indeed, Trump’s Super PACs—Save America and MAGA PAC—spent more than $50 million on legal bills using money that was raised from donors even after they were told where their money would go. That huge sum has sucked up a lot of the oxygen in the room and likely will continue to leave the rest of the GOP gasping for spare funds.

In McDaniel’s place, Trump has backed his daughter-in-law Lara Trump as co-chair, and campaign senior adviser Chris LaCivita as CFO. With Trump’s endorsement, they are a shoo-in. For her part, Lara Trump has been fairly non-committal about whether RNC funds would be used to cover Trump’s mounting legal bills, as it had before he declared his candidacy. Trump’s campaign insists that his Super PACs will continue to foot the costs of his defense.

In the end it doesn’t matter much whether the RNC or Trump’s Super PACs pay the legal pipers. That’s all money that could have been spent on campaign ads and ground games. And with several GOP state parties also in dire financial straits in critical battleground states, including Michigan, Arizona and Georgia, the prospect of much of the money raised from donors going straight to Trump’s lawyers cannot be comforting.

Judgment day is coming

By the end of this week, Trump needs to come up with a bond to cover the $83.3 million judgment against him so he can file his appeal. Not long afterwards, sometime later this month, Trump will need to come up with yet another appeal bond to cover the more than $450 million civil fraud judgment.

It seems Trump may not actually have the money to do this easily, despite his claims of being a billionaire and having $400 million in cash on hand. He has tried to bargain the court down by offering far smaller of a bond—just $100 million—but that got slapped down.

Even if he comes up with the funds to put up these bonds, he could lose both appeals and be on the hook for over half a billion in judgments. That means possible fire sales of his properties, which might already have been designated as collateral for loans to cover the bonds.

This is a longer way of saying that Trump will face difficult financial circumstances later this month that could imperil his entire business empire. If the RNC kicks into gear and starts to raise tens of millions of dollars for the campaign, that money might be highly tempting for Trump to try and plunder in some way.

A hopeless attempt to protect the funds

Parts of the RNC leadership are already in a bit of a panic. Henry Barbour is an RNC Committee member from Mississippi, and he had enough courage, or perhaps foolhardiness, to propose a resolution that would prevent RNC funds from being used to pay any candidate’s legal fees, referring of course specifically to Trump.

The resolution is rather naive in both its lofty goals and its failure to recognize that this is now Trump’s party, through and through. It says a lot, however, about where some in the party wish it still was, and it is clear people are worried about where all the money raised might go. It reads in relevant part:

WHEREAS, the Republican National Committee raises many millions of dollars each year with the singular purpose of electing Republican candidates across the country;

WHEREAS, the RNC spends tens of millions of dollars to help ensure free and fair elections;

WHEREAS, the Republican National Committee should focus its spending on political efforts associated with winning elections and make clear from this point forward that the RNC’s financial resources are to be used to assist candidates across the country winning elections in 2024;

WHEREAS, spending any RNC financial resources for any candidate’s personal, business, or political legal expenses, not related to the 2024 election cycle, does not serve the RNC’s primary mission of helping to elect our candidates in 2024; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, that the Republican National Committee will not pay the legal bills of any of our candidates for any federal or state office, but will focus our spending on efforts directly related to the 2024 election cycle.

The rather cute part is that, even were the resolution to pass, it is not binding upon the organization. Trump’s people could simply ignore it. Still, they are working to defeat it because of what it represents.

“It's an insult,” said one Trump-allied RNC committee member. “It's kind of an F You to the Trump campaign. That's why.” 

Barbour is under few illusions about its chances of success. “This is not going to pass, I understand that,” he said. “It’s about making a point.”

If Trump supporters grow tired of donating to his PACs only to see their funds go straight to his attorneys, any amount of money sitting in the RNC’s bank accounts would almost certainly become fair game for Trump. It’s actually hard to imagine him not touching that money.

What this means in practical terms is that Trump’s allies can raise tens of millions under the RNC banner, where the money is supposed to go to candidates across the country, but then dip into that as needed the deeper Trump’s legal troubles grow. And knowing Trump, he’ll find a way to funnel a lot of that Republican money to organizations, vendors and properties he controls.

This is potentially very bad news if you are a Republican counting on national party funds for your campaign or a major donor looking to lift all Republican ships. GOP fundraising already has taken a hit from major changes in House leadership, where Speaker Johnson has none of the experience and connections that his ousted predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, had. And now McConnell is stepping down from GOP leadership in the Senate, which could bring MAGA-aligned sycophants into power who could further sour the moods of some big donors. 

To this potent mix, the GOP must now add Trump’s legal bills and judgments. They are now a heavy anchor weighing him down, choking off his ability to operate and execute big media buys. Knowing Donald Trump, he will consider any funds that do come in, no matter to which arm of the party, to be fair game. 

After all, Trump would far rather see other financial ships in the Republican Party sink before his own ever does.