Friend,
In the post- Citizens United world, I guess we’ve grown accustomed to presidential candidates raising money from big donors. It’s the unhappy result of a conservative Supreme Court that equates money with speech, and it’s given rise to a host of problems in our politics.
But while Americans may have become used to candidates raising money before an election, few are comfortable with the idea of the President catering to big donors after the election. That’s what makes last month’s New York Times investigation [[link removed]] so remarkable.
President Trump has been fundraising for a variety of causes – his super PAC, his ballroom fund, and other favored groups. He’s raised about half a billion dollars, and much of it has come from those who stand to benefit from the President’s good graces. So it’s alarming to read that the President closely tracks which corporations have contributed. Lobbyists are now explicitly recommending that their clients fork over donations to win Trump’s favor.
The Times looked into 346 individuals who gave at least $250,000 each, and reporters found that more than half of them had received some benefit from the Trump Administration. Some of the examples of corruption are stunning.
Take, for example, the woman in Florida who provided a $2.5 million contribution to MAGA Inc., then saw her father receive an extremely lenient deal from the Department of Justice in a major corruption case. Or the couple who donated $1 million to the President’s inaugural committee and saw their son nominated to become an ambassador. Or the company accused of colluding over ticket prices that donated $250,000, then saw their co-founder pardoned by the President.
In addition to the Trump family personally profitting [[link removed]] off of the crypto industry, the President has been remarkably lenient towards cryptocurrency companies that have written big checks to his favorite groups. The Securities and Exchange Commission dropped lawsuits against Coinbase, Kraken, and Ripple after they each donated $1 million to the President's inaugural committee. An investigation into Robinhood was dropped after a $2 million donation. Crypto Bros have benefited hugely from Trump's policies, which is no surprise since at least 27 companies or executives with interests in crypto have given a combined $58 million to Trump's groups.
Crypto bros aren't the only major corporate actors seeing concrete benefit from their donations. Numerous national security experts have raised alarms [[link removed]] about selling F-35 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia. But Lockheed Martin, the primary manufacturer of those jets, donated $10 million to Trump’s ballroom and another $5 million to a Trump-favored fund. Trump then announced that he would approve the sales, and he invited Lockheed’s chief executive to attend a black tie dinner honoring Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia.
A healthcare company called Extremity Care was going to be negatively impacted when a Biden-era Medicare regulation came into effect. They donated $5 million to Trump’s PAC, then paid to attend a dinner at Mar-a-Lago with President Trump. The next month, the administration announced that it would delay the new regulation.
An entrepreneur donated $1 million to Trump’s PAC, then attended a donor dinner with the President. Soon thereafter, the President pardoned her son, sparing him $4.4 million in fines and an 18-month sentence for employment tax crimes.
I could go on and on. In fact, the New York Times does [[link removed]] . But here’s the point: this President is using the power of his office to raise enormous sums of money. In exchange for those massive donations, he is selling government positions, presidential pardons, and regulatory influence to those who are willing to cut a check.
If you’re as disgusted as I am, it’s time to speak up. We have less than 300 days until the midterm elections – don’t let any of them go to waste. Will you help Democrats win back the House, flip competitive seats in the U.S. Senate, and create a real check on the Trump Administration’s abuse of power?
— Jim
Paid for by Himes for Congress
Himes for Congress
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Fairfield, CT 06824
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