How Do Small Donors' Contributions To Trump's Campaign Turn Into Revenue For The Former President?

last year

Forbes Staff Writer Zach Everson joins Brittany Lewis on "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss the flow of small dollar donors' contributions to former President Donald Trump's campaign are turning into revenue for his businesses.

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Transcript

00:00 Donald Trump, as we know, is not putting his own money into campaigning for president,

00:04 but you're reporting this, that money from small dollar donors turns into revenue for Trump.

00:09 How exactly is this happening?

00:11 He's been doing this since he first started running back in the 2016 campaign, where

00:18 what happens is supporters donate to his campaign. His campaign then spends money at one of his

00:25 hotels, resorts, clubs, all sorts of options there. You're buying his books. And it's not

00:32 just his campaign, but it's also PACs that are aligned with him. And when they do that,

00:37 they pay money to his businesses. So it's a way, the money kind of flows that way from

00:43 the donors through the campaign to the Trump organization.

00:45 And is this legal?

00:50 It depends. It really depends on how he's spending it. He's gotten in the problems before

00:57 with the presidential inaugural committee that was found to, Washington, D.C. Attorney General

01:04 investigated whether it had overpaid money to book rooms at the Trump Hotel in D.C.

01:09 And I believe they reached a settlement there, if I remember correctly. So it has gotten into

01:14 some problem. But no, I mean, I think by and large, they're providing a service. They're

01:20 getting hotel rooms. I think it would be a problem if they were booking hotel rooms and

01:24 not using them. But there's no evidence this has happened. But it has proved to be a solid

01:28 revenue stream. And he's had the government do that as well throughout when he was president.

01:34 And as we're reporting here, he's continued to make some money off the government.

How Do Small Donors' Contributions To Trump's Campaign Turn Into Revenue For The Former President?

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