American Opportunity Alliance

Assessing the presidential race, the American Opportunity Alliance has invited representatives from both the Trump and Haley campaigns to make their pitches at a meeting next week.A network of Republican megadonors has invited aides to both Donald J. Trump and Nikki Haley to make presentations at the group’s winter meeting next week, as the wealthy contributors assess the presidential race with just nine months until Election Day.The network, known as the American Opportunity Alliance, is expected to hear from Ms. Haley’s campaign manager, Betsy Ankney, and Mr. Trump’s top adviser, Susie Wiles, at the gathering in Palm Beach, Fla., according to two people familiar with the event.The group’s meeting was reported earlier by Puck.The network was founded a decade ago by a group of wealthy donors, including members of the Ricketts family, which owns the Chicago Cubs, and the investors Paul Singer and Kenneth Griffin.But the donors in the American Opportunity Alliance do not move in unison, and people supporting Ms. Haley — and who had supported Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who dropped out of the race last Sunday — are part of the network. Some members of the group have been open about wanting a candidate other than Mr. Trump.But even when officials representing Ms. Haley and Mr. DeSantis presented at the group’s meeting in Dallas in early October — when their campaigns were the only two whose advisers had been invited — some people working with A.O.A. were clear that the focus was more on the general election than on the primary cycle. A Republican strategist working with the group called Mr. Trump’s path to the nomination “straightforward” at the time.Since then, Mr. Trump has won both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary, beating Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley in the first contest and Ms. Haley in the second, despite having little by way of major donor money. He also has some supporters who have worked with A.O.A. in the past, such as Linda McMahon, who led the Small Business Administration under President Trump.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More