WASHINGTON — Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign reported third-quarter receipts of $24.5 million to the Federal Election Commission on Sunday — a little more than half of the $45.5 million number it bragged about earlier this month.
The discrepancy may suggest that it is becoming more expensive for the coup-attempting former president’s fundraising committee, which sends cash to both his presidential campaign and to a separate entity covering many of his legal bills, to collect donations from his millions of followers.
Trump’s campaign did not respond to HuffPost’s queries on the matter.
The Save America Joint Fundraising Committee is not required to disclose its income and expenses for the second half of 2023 until the end of January, so it will be months before the financial picture becomes clearer. A transfer from the Save America Committee accounts for more than 98% of the amount that Trump’s campaign told the FEC it raised.
The joint fundraising committee has been collecting money for Trump’s Save America “leadership” committee since Trump left office three weeks after his failed coup in 2021. The fundraising committee then began allocating 95% of its proceeds to Trump’s 2024 campaign after he announced his bid a year ago. The rest of it continues to go to Save America, which can essentially spend the money however Trump wants it to be spent — mostly on defense lawyers.
As Trump’s bills for his various criminal cases began piling up, the fundraising committee changed the allocation formula several months ago, so that 10% now goes to Save America, and 90% to the campaign.
Save America also does not have to disclose its income and expenses again until January.
During the first six months of 2023, the joint fundraising committee raised $54 million and spent $20.6 million to do so. It then transferred $29.2 million to Trump’s campaign and $2.2 million to Save America.
If the $45.5 million figure announced by the Trump campaign in an Oct. 4 press release is the amount the joint fundraising committee collected, it suggests Trump’s operation spent about $20 million raising money in the third quarter, but this time collected $9 million less for the effort.
The campaign’s earlier boast of having $37.5 million in the bank heading into the fourth quarter is, however, reflected in the FEC filing.
Trump is facing 91 felony charges in four separate criminal indictments, two of them for his actions that culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol designed to keep him in power despite his having lost the 2020 election.
He nevertheless leads his 2024 rivals for the GOP presidential nomination by wide margins in national polls, as well as polls in states that vote early in the primary season.