Campaign Finance

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      For Ron DeSantis, Overflowing War Chest Obscures the Challenges Ahead

      by

      As he prepares for a widely expected 2024 campaign, the Florida governor has at least $110 million in allied committees. But he will also have to navigate a series of financial and political hurdles.As Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida prepares to take a widely anticipated leap into the 2024 presidential campaign, one of his chief strengths is his ability to raise huge sums from deep-pocketed donors.But his formidable war chest — at least $110 million in state and federal committees aligned with him — is no guarantee of success on the national stage, and his financial firepower brings with it a series of challenges he must navigate to capture the Republican nomination.Mr. DeSantis’s unsteady debut on the national stage over the past month, including remarks about Ukraine that alarmed many Republicans and hesitant counterpunches against former President Donald J. Trump, has also showcased his aloof and at times strained relationship with donors.Recent additions of seasoned advisers to his team and to an allied super PAC have allayed some concerns, strategists and donors said, but the early rookie mistakes, as one Republican donor put it, may have rattled influential would-be backers. Mr. DeSantis’s poll numbers have sagged against Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly taunted Mr. DeSantis and weaponized his fund-raising strength against him, painting the governor as a puppet of wealthy Republican elites.Those barbs by Mr. Trump — who was largely forsaken by big donors even before his recent indictment by New York prosecutors — underscore the political reality that no matter how much money Mr. DeSantis has, he will have to overcome the grass-roots enthusiasm and army of small donors that Mr. Trump continues to command. The former president’s popular appeal was particularly apparent this past week, with his campaign announcing on Wednesday that it had raised $12 million off the news of his indictment.Mr. DeSantis will also have to cultivate and tend to relationships with the everyday financial players in Republican politics — the millionaire donors, bundlers and fund-raisers whose enduring support is necessary to sustain a presidential campaign. He has, by many accounts, kept these donors at arm’s length while touring the country this past month, opting for rallies, book signings and closed-door meetings with allies instead of fund-raising dinners.Most of Mr. DeSantis’s campaign cash is tied up in a Florida political action committee.Chris Dumond/Getty ImagesThough it is still early in the campaign cycle, some donors and strategists have questioned whether Mr. DeSantis’s skills as a politician are lagging behind his robust bank account.“He is in the most enviable financial position of any candidate,” possibly including Mr. Trump, said Mike Murphy, a longtime Republican strategist. “There are questions in Republican circles about DeSantis’s candidate skills — can he make the transition from being the governor of a Republican state, where you exist on people’s TV screens, to the microscope of New Hampshire and Iowa?”Mr. DeSantis also has a campaign-finance conundrum on his hands: Most of his money — more than $80 million, as of the end of February — is tied up in a Florida political action committee. He is prohibited by law from transferring that “soft” money — dollars raised without federally imposed limits — into a presidential campaign.Any move to use that money in support of his national ambitions — including transferring it to an affiliated super PAC, called Never Back Down — would still be likely to raise red flags among campaign finance watchdogs, although campaign finance experts said the Federal Election Commission, which has for years been deadlocked between the parties, was unlikely to act on it.“Can he take that money, which was raised through his state PAC, and use it to advance his presidential campaign directly or through a federal super PAC supporting him?” said Saurav Ghosh, a former F.E.C. enforcement lawyer who is now the director of federal campaign finance reform at the Campaign Legal Center, a watchdog group. “The common-sense answer, and the law, says no.”Mr. Ghosh added, “The unfortunate reality is that the F.E.C. is probably not going to do anything about it.”In a statement, the F.E.C.’s chairwoman, Dara Lindenbaum, and vice chairman, Sean Cooksey, said any assertion that the commission’s bipartisan structure prevented it from fulfilling its mission was “misinformed.”“Without commenting on any specific case, commissioners assess each enforcement matter on its merits, and we reach agreement in nearly 90 percent of them,” they said.Representatives of Mr. DeSantis did not respond to requests for comment. In a statement Saturday, Erin Perrine, communications director for the affiliated super PAC, Never Back Down, said, “Governor DeSantis isn’t even an announced candidate and supporters from all 50 states have already stepped up and donated to the Never Back Down movement. Should he decide to run for president, he will be a grass-roots-fueled force to be reckoned with.”At the end of February, as Mr. DeSantis began a national tour of speaking engagements and promotional events for his new book, his allies and backers stepped up preparations for a possible presidential run.Friends of Ron DeSantis, a Florida PAC that had supported his successful re-election effort in November, continued to take in millions of dollars, including $10 million in February alone.The vast majority of money the group has raised since the election has come from a few rich donors. Jeff Yass, a Philadelphia investment manager and major Republican donor, gave $2.5 million; Joe Ricketts, the founder of TD Ameritrade and an owner of the Chicago Cubs, gave $1 million; and Gregory P. Cook, a founder of a Utah-based multilevel marketing company that sells essential oils, gave $1.3 million.Mr. Yass has given tens of millions of dollars in recent years to conservative and libertarian candidates and committees, including the Club for Growth PAC, an arm of a prominent conservative anti-tax group that has sought to move the Republican Party beyond Mr. Trump. Mr. Ricketts, the patriarch of a powerful political family in Nebraska, gave at least $1 million to support Mr. Trump in 2016, after initially opposing him in the primaries. Mr. Cook does not have a record of major gifts to federal candidates.DeSantis supporters at an event before his re-election as Florida’s governor in November.Zack Wittman for The New York TimesJohn Childs, a billionaire Republican donor in Florida, gave $1 million to Friends of Ron DeSantis in late February, as did Stefan Brodie, the founder of a Pennsylvania chemical company.In March, Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, a former Trump administration official, announced the creation of Never Back Down.The group, which recently brought on the veteran Republican strategist Jeff Roe as an adviser, said it had raised at least $30 million since March 9.Super PACs, though powerful tools for pooling enormous sums of unregulated cash, come with drawbacks for candidates. For one, the campaigns cannot directly control how that money is spent. Crucially, television ads also cost more for PACs: Federal law lets candidate committees pay a lower price.So the money raised by official campaigns — ideally from bundlers who can summon hundreds of friends and allies to max out their individual contributions, now capped at $3,300 per person — is often worth more to the candidate.“You make me choose between a bundler and a big check writer, I’d rather have the hard dollars,” Mr. Murphy said. “Most bundlers really need to be pursued — and that goes back to the interpersonal skills.”For that reason, Mr. DeSantis’s nine-figure haul is hard to compare to the $21.8 million that, at year’s end, sat in the federal campaign account of Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, another potential Republican candidate.Mr. Scott is also supported by a super PAC, the Opportunity Matters Fund, which since 2020 has raised tens of millions of dollars — including at least $35 million from the Oracle founder Larry Ellison.Mr. DeSantis has been touring important primary states while he promotes his new book.Scott McIntyre for The New York TimesAnd big-dollar fund-raising does not always translate to victory. Donors and strategists cite the examples of former Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin and former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida as warnings. Cast as front-runners for the 2016 election, both took in huge cash hauls in 2015 — Mr. Bush raised more than $100 million — only to fizzle out of the race early.In his recent stops in Iowa, New York, Pennsylvania and Georgia, Mr. DeSantis has offered a preview of how he might interact with donors as a national candidate. Some Republican donors, strategists and bundlers took note of what they said appeared to be Mr. DeSantis’s diffidence or even discomfort with the mingling and small talk that are staples of the campaign trail, particularly with contributors.Many also said, though, that some donors and bundlers were waiting until the election cycle was further along to take a side.Some were taken aback by Mr. DeSantis’s comments last month calling Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a “territorial dispute” and saying the war was not a vital U.S. interest. Those remarks, coupled with his aversion to old-fashioned “grip and grin” politics, may have given some supporters pause.“I think he’s had a wobbly few weeks in communicating to donors,” said Rob Stutzman, a public affairs consultant who worked for former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and for Mitt Romney’s 2008 presidential campaign. Donors keen to move on from Mr. Trump might “start to imagine — maybe this isn’t the way,” he said.Mr. Trump’s campaign, which he announced in November, said at the end of January that it had raised $9.5 million — a sluggish start in comparison to front-runners from past elections. Though official numbers will not be out for several weeks, his campaign appears poised to see a significant boost after the indictment.An affiliated super PAC, MAGA Inc., reported $54.1 million on hand at the end of 2022.Last month, MAGA Inc. filed an ethics complaint with Florida officials accusing Mr. DeSantis of operating a shadow presidential campaign.A spokeswoman for the governor’s office, Taryn Fenske, called the complaint part of a “list of frivolous and politically motivated attacks.” More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Trump’s Bet: Criminal Case Could Help His Campaign, and Vice Versa

      by

      The former president aims to apply political pressure to prosecutors — while revving up support for his campaign by portraying himself as a victim of Democratic persecution.PALM BEACH, Fla. — At one end of the palatial Donald J. Trump Grand Ballroom at Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday, the former president made his first public comments about his arrest. At the opposite end of the hall — a space illuminated by 16 crystal chandeliers and bigger than four professional basketball courts — were several cardboard boxes stuffed with white campaign T-shirts.The shirts read “I STAND WITH TRUMP,” and had a date printed on them in bold type: 03-30-2023 — the day Mr. Trump was indicted by a Manhattan grand jury for his role in a hush-money scandal.After Mr. Trump’s indictment, it has become impossible to tell where his legal defense ends and his presidential campaign begins.The blurring of the lines between his White House bid and his mounting court battles is at the center of a high-stakes, norm-shattering bet from Mr. Trump: that he is capable of swaying public opinion to such a degree that he can simultaneously bolster his legal case and gin up enthusiasm — and campaign contributions — from his supporters.His legal calculation, according to aides and allies close to him, is that his pressure campaign against the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, will lead to his acquittal and deter other prosecutors from seeking additional indictments — though some of his lawyers have warned him that’s unlikely.Politically, Mr. Trump’s strategy is to paint himself as a victim of Democratic persecution, generating sympathy and good will to aid his campaign for a third consecutive Republican presidential nomination.Trump supporters outside the Manhattan courthouse where Mr. Trump was arraigned on Tuesday over his role in a hush-money payment.Ahmed Gaber for The New York Times“President Trump isn’t just right to speak this way, he has a duty to use his bully pulpit to expose corrupt and uncontrolled prosecutors,” said Rod R. Blagojevich, a former Democratic governor of Illinois who was imprisoned for corruption until Mr. Trump commuted his sentence in 2020. “I applaud him for it.”Mr. Trump and his allies repeatedly have made baseless accusations of wrongdoing by Mr. Bragg.No one can say for certain whether a recent uptick for Mr. Trump in presidential primary polls has been the result of his braiding of legal and political tactics, or the recent stumbles by his chief potential Republican rival, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, or some combination of the two.But Mr. Trump’s conflation of his political and legal campaigns has been on display for weeks.His public remarks about his arrest on Tuesday were made from the same stage — surrounded by the same “Make America Great Again” banners and American flags — where he announced his 2024 White House bid nearly five months earlier. One of the lawyers seated near Mr. Trump during his arraignment in the New York courthouse was Boris Epshteyn, who has provided both political and legal advice to the former president and other Republican candidates.At Mr. Trump’s first major rally of the race last month in Texas, his campaign distributed “Witch Hunt” signs for the crowd to wave. The campaign has sent more than three dozen fund-raising appeals to supporters this week — each one referring to Mr. Trump’s legal battles. On Tuesday, one email solicited campaign contributions in return for T-shirts printed with a fake mug shot of the former president and the words “not guilty.” (The authorities in New York opted not to take an actual mug shot.)“Donald Trump has been masterful at blurring the line between his own potential legal and political peril,” said Rob Godfrey, a longtime Republican strategist based in South Carolina. “But now that he faces actual legal peril, it will be fascinating to see how loyal his supporters are, whether they have the same tolerance for chaos he continues to and whether any of his opponents figure out a way to peel anyone away from him.”Mr. Trump has long viewed public opinion as the solution to an increasingly lengthy list of personal dramas, political scandals and legal crises. He used similar tactics as president during the 22-month investigation led by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, and his approval rating was virtually unchanged. Mr. Trump’s legal advisers had urged him to create a team outside the White House structure to respond publicly to the Mueller inquiry, but he declined.One of Mr. Trump’s political high-water marks — in terms of re-election polling and fund-raising — came in February 2020, after a Republican-controlled Senate acquitted him in his first impeachment trial.More recently, he has spent months seeking to make state and federal prosecutors investigating his behavior appear indistinguishable from the Democratic and Republican opponents actively trying to stunt his political career.Mr. Trump has proved his skills at using investigations, impeachments and indictments to inflate his campaign coffers (and using a portion of those contributions to pay legal fees). His campaign has claimed to have raised more than $12 million from online contributions during the past week since he was indicted by the grand jury.But his strategy in the hush-money case to mingle his legal troubles with his 2024 presidential campaign carries significant risks and masks, at least for now, potential problems.While the Trump team has celebrated the recent influx of campaign cash, there have been questions about how many more new donors he can tap and whether he can maintain his fund-raising prowess without an immediate crisis to leverage. His only public campaign finance report so far showed a less-than-stellar haul for such a prominent political figure.The bigger question for the former president is how attacks on the court system and law enforcement — on Wednesday he called on his party to defund the F.B.I. and Justice Department in response to his criminal indictment — will help him win back moderate Republicans and independent voters who have abandoned him, and his preferred candidates and causes, for three consecutive election cycles.At Mr. Trump’s first big campaign rally of the 2024 race, in Waco, Texas.Christopher Lee for The New York TimesMr. Trump has used his standing as a former president — and as the front-runner for the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination — to repeatedly describe the felony charges in New York (and open criminal investigations in Georgia and Washington) as a politically motivated attack aimed at undermining his White House bid.But that message ignores a series of electoral disappointments for Republicans since Mr. Trump’s 2016 victory made him the face of the party. Those defeats — in 2018, 2020 and 2022 — have been largely the result of a Democratic base motivated to vote against him and a significant defection of moderate Republicans turned off by his antics.Additionally, every major investigation focusing on Mr. Trump started well before he announced his third presidential campaign. By the time he opened his White House bid in November, Mr. Trump had spent months pushing for an unusually early campaign introduction, a move intended in part to shield him from a stream of damaging revelations emerging from the investigation into his attempts to cling to power after losing the 2020 election.Similarly, Mr. Trump has been using his legal battle to energize his enthusiastic backers and coalesce support in a divided Republican Party. While public opinion polls show Mr. Trump has a wide lead over most other primary contenders and potential rivals, about half of the party remains opposed to his candidacy.In the Mar-a-Lago ballroom on Tuesday, Mr. Trump’s campaign set up the room with a center aisle for the former president and his V.I.P.s to walk to their seats.The aisle resembled something a wedding party might use to make an entrance. But it also appeared to embody the very line that Mr. Trump has sought to blur: Mr. Epshteyn, one of Mr. Trump’s legal counselors, smiled and waved as the crowd cheered his arrival along with several campaign aides and family members.“The only crime that I have committed,” Mr. Trump said a few minutes later from center stage, “is to fearlessly defend our nation from those who seek to destroy it.” More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Nikki Haley Raises Over $11 Million to Start Her 2024 Campaign

      by

      Former President Donald J. Trump, in comparison, raised only $9.5 million during the same period after announcing his third presidential run.Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador, raised more than $11 million in the first six weeks of her presidential run, her campaign said on Wednesday, a sizable sum that easily eclipses what former President Donald J. Trump was able to raise during the same period after announcing his candidacy.Ms. Haley received 70,000 donations, from all 50 states, the vast majority of which were under $200, her campaign said in a news release that described the contributions as a sign of her broad appeal and effective fund-raising efforts.Ms. Haley was the first major Republican candidate to enter the race with Mr. Trump, who announced his third bid for the White House shortly after the midterm elections in November. He raised only $9.5 million in his first six weeks, his campaign said in February, a relatively weak showing.But the announcement of criminal charges against him in a hush-money case appears to be helping him make up for the sluggish start: He has pulled in more than $12 million since his indictment on Friday, his campaign said on Wednesday.Early polling has shown Ms. Haley trailing significantly behind Mr. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who has not yet formally entered the race. She has sought, in her early and energetic campaign stops, to position herself as a “tough-as-nails woman” who could offer a seasoned, reasonable alternative.The fund-raising sum reflects the six-week period between Feb. 14, when Ms. Haley formally entered the race, and the end of March. An official figure will be released in the coming weeks as part of the campaign’s required quarterly filing. She had about $7.8 million cash on hand at the end of the quarter, her campaign said.Eric J. Tanenblatt, a Georgia-based Republican strategist and fund-raiser who has supported Ms. Haley since her state campaigns, said the numbers “solidify” her as a serious candidate and give her “a good foundation to build on.”“It is a robust number,” said Mr. Tanenblatt, who hosted a fund-raiser for Ms. Haley last month. “I don’t think anyone should underestimate her.”The numbers released Wednesday do not include money raised by Stand for America PAC, the political action committee she created in 2021 and which is aligned with her campaign. Such groups can raise unlimited funds from donors, while funds raised by the campaign committees are held to strict caps for individual donors.Her super PAC had raised $17 million and reported $2 million on hand at the end of 2022, filings show. The next round of figures is due in July.A super PAC supporting Mr. Trump reported having $54.1 million on hand at the end of 2022. As for Mr. DeSantis, a super PAC aligned with him said Tuesday it had raised $30 million since March 9. He also had at least $80 million in a state committee at the end of February, Florida records show.But it is the funds raised by campaign committees, despite the restraints, that are considered a more critical measure of a candidate’s popular appeal. The money they raise goes further — for example, federal law allows political candidates to pay the lowest available price for broadcast ads, while super PACs have no such protections.“In just six weeks, Nikki Haley’s massive fund-raising and active retail campaigning in early voting states makes her a force to be reckoned with,” Ms. Haley’s campaign manager, Betsy Ankney, said in a statement Wednesday. “Voters and donors are clearly responding to Nikki’s conservative message and her call for a new generation of leadership to make America strong and proud.”Ms. Haley has made a big ground-level push in early primary states. In February and March, she made several trips to Iowa and New Hampshire for town halls, meetings with local lawmakers, and other voter events. More

    • 125 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Trump’s Day of Martyrdom Didn’t Go Quite as He Expected

      by

      Court officials didn’t take a mug shot of former President Donald J. Trump at his arraignment on Tuesday. But it’s not because he didn’t want one. The authorities didn’t really need an ID photo of one of the most recognizable faces on earth.Mr. Trump wanted that mug shot, CNN reported, and when he didn’t get it, his presidential campaign put a fake one on a fund-raising T-shirt. He wanted it for the same reason he brought his private videographer from Florida to the courthouse: to contrive physical relics of his martyrdom at the hands of his leftist oppressors, proof of the vast conspiracy that he can wave at rallies and blare on his social media platform.But a few things happened on Tuesday that Mr. Trump didn’t count on. The images — and the details of the case itself — sent a far more serious message than he expected.Instead of a defiant N.Y.P.D. photo or a raised fist, the lasting image of the day may well be that of a humbled former president looking hunched, angry and nervous at the courtroom defense table, a suddenly small man wedged between his lawyers, as two New York State court officers loomed behind him in a required posture of making sure the defendant stayed in his place.And the 34 felony charges, to which Mr. Trump pleaded not guilty, turned out to be more significant and more sweeping than previously suspected. The Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, described a broad conspiracy, with Mr. Trump at the center, to falsify business records for the purpose of unlawfully influencing the 2016 presidential election. The former president, he said, “orchestrated a scheme with others to influence the 2016 presidential election by identifying and purchasing negative information about him to suppress its publication and benefit the defendant’s electoral prospects.”It’s been known for a while that the case revolved around hush-money payments that Mr. Trump made to a porn star, Stormy Daniels, to cover up an affair they had. Falsifying business records can sometimes be charged as a misdemeanor in New York State, and to bump up the charges to felonies requires proof that they were falsified to conceal another crime. That crime was widely believed to be a federal campaign finance violation, and some legal experts described that combination as an untested legal theory, because federal violations are outside Mr. Bragg’s jurisdiction.But it turned out that Mr. Bragg and the grand jury had more than one basis for making the charges felonies. The prosecutor argued on Tuesday that in addition to the federal campaign finance violations, Mr. Trump violated a state election law that makes it a crime to prevent any person from being elected to public office by unlawful means while acting in a conspiracy with others. Mr. Bragg is on much safer ground tying fraudulent business records to a violation of state law, because the defense cannot argue that he lacks jurisdiction on the matter — though Mr. Trump’s lawyers can still argue that state law doesn’t apply to a federal election.And that wasn’t the only state law that Mr. Bragg said he would cite. The payments to Ms. Daniels were made by Mr. Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen, who was reimbursed by Mr. Trump in a fraudulent way, the prosecution said. The charging document said this reimbursement was illegally disguised as income in a way that “mischaracterized, for tax purposes, the true nature of the payments made in furtherance of the scheme.” So add state tax violations to the list.The charges also revealed the breadth of Mr. Bragg’s case, showing he intends to persuade a jury of a conspiracy that extended from Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen to David Pecker, a former publisher of The National Enquirer, who was allegedly paid $150,000 by Mr. Trump to procure the silence of a second woman with whom Mr. Trump had an affair, the former Playboy model Karen McDougal. It was not certain until Tuesday that the relationship with Ms. McDougal would be part of the case. The felony charges are specifically about Ms. Daniels, but to prove them, Mr. Bragg made it clear that he would describe a much broader pattern of payoffs that included Ms. McDougal.Prosecutors also revealed that they would rely on more than just the oral testimony of their star witness, Mr. Cohen, who already served a year in federal prison for his role in the payments and whose credibility will be challenged. There will, for example, be an audio recording of Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen discussing how exactly the payment to Ms. McDougal should be made to The National Enquirer’s parent company. And the evidence will also include texts and email messages discussing Mr. Trump’s suggestion to delay paying Ms. Daniels until after the election, “because at that point it would not matter if the story became public,” prosecutors said. (Those texts may effectively short-circuit any attempt by Mr. Trump to claim the payments were made solely to prevent his wife from learning about his affairs.)Mr. Bragg will have to prove all these charges in court, of course, assuming the case goes to trial, and the charging documents did not reveal more than the surface of the evidence he plans to use. It’s still not a slam-dunk case. But these crimes are hardly novel ones for the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which is used to prosecuting business record cases, and are far from the one-off political persecution that Republicans are claiming it to be.Inevitably, the images of the day and the details of the charges will have a cumulative and wearying effect on many voters. Mr. Trump thinks only of his core supporters, who will share his rage at his ordeal on Tuesday and demand revenge. But there aren’t enough base Trump voters to guarantee him even the Republican nomination, let alone the general election in 2024. Will the images of Mr. Trump at a defendant’s table, not to mention the headlines about 34 counts of paying hush money to a porn star, win a substantial number of swing voters to his side?It’s hard to imagine all of this will really do him any good, particularly if there are charges down the road from other prosecutors alleging abuse of his presidential office. Mr. Trump may sell a few fake T-shirts, but with the law closing in on him, he will have a much harder time selling himself.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

    • 188 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      You Could Have Walked a Block Away and Had No Clue Trump Just Got Arrested

      by

      I missed George Santos at the protest outside the courthouse where Donald Trump was later arraigned on Tuesday, and I couldn’t hear a thing Marjorie Taylor Greene said over the screams of counter-demonstrators and the incessant blowing of whistles. They were the two biggest names who turned out to show their support for Trump on a day that felt at once historic and very small.The police put up metal barriers dividing a block-sized park near the courthouse in two, with dozens of Trump opponents on one side, dozens of Trump acolytes on the other, and cops everywhere. Altogether, there were hundreds of people, often screaming at each other across the divide, chants of “U.S.A.” competing with chants of “Lock Him Up!” Some characters were familiar from the Trump campaign road show, including Dion Cini, a peddler of Trump merchandise who flew a giant “Trump or Death” flag, and Maurice Symonette, founder of the groupuscule Blacks for Trump and onetime member of a violent Black supremacist cult. “He had sex with a prostitute,” Symonette said of Trump, apparently referring to the adult film star Stormy Daniels. “How is that against the law? Who hasn’t done that?”Representative George Santos.Mark Peterson for The New York TimesRepresentative Marjorie Taylor Greene.Mark Peterson for The New York TimesOf course, Trump wasn’t indicted for his affairs, but for the steps he allegedly took to cover them up. Before the indictment was unsealed, rumors flew across Twitter that it included a conspiracy count, but in the end, all 34 counts were for falsifying business records in connection with the payoff to silence Daniels, which Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg argued was connected to a broader scheme to squelch negative stories about Trump.According to the indictment, the business record falsifications were done “with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof.” Though no other crime is charged, the statement of facts accompanying the indictment accuses Trump of violating election laws. It’s the connection to another crime that turns falsifying business records from a misdemeanor into a felony.Observers from across the political spectrum have been skeptical of the legal theory that underlies Bragg’s case. As The New York Times reported in March, “Combining the criminal charge with a violation of state election law would be a novel legal theory for any criminal case, let alone one against the former president, raising the possibility that a judge or appellate court could throw it out or reduce the felony charge to a misdemeanor.” Trump, in other words, may still wriggle out of this predicament.As I’ve argued before, if Trump’s role in the hush-money payments broke the law, it’s a serious matter, because those payments helped him get elected, and the plot to cover them up sent his former lawyer to prison. Trump, the statement of facts says, “orchestrated a scheme with others to influence the 2016 presidential election by identifying and purchasing negative information about him to suppress its publication and benefit the defendant’s electoral prospects.” If this is true, it’s perverse to suggest that Trump’s success in this scheme — represented by him winning the presidency — is a reason not to prosecute him.Nevertheless, for all the hype going into Tuesday, the indictment feels anticlimactic. “True and accurate business records are important everywhere, to be sure,” said Bragg in his news conference after the arraignment. “They are all the more important in Manhattan, the financial center of the world.” Trump, like everyone else, should be held accountable if he failed to keep such records. We’re not owed an indictment commensurate with his depravity. Still, these are hard charges to get excited about.Indeed, what’s struck me over the last two days in New York is a distinct lack of excitement. Many who detest Trump, I suspect, have lost faith in the ability of the legal system to hold him to account. And while his supporters may threaten civil war, not many of them seem willing to brave Manhattan, which they’ve been told is a crime-ridden hellhole.Earlier this week, Roger Stone, the political dirty trickster and longtime Trump ally, promoted a Monday rally outside Trump Tower. When I went there, only a handful of people had shown up. Tuesday’s turnout was larger, but still felt more desultory than menacing, despite some threatening rhetoric. (One man carried a sign with a noose affixed to it, signifying his hopes for members of the “Liberal Biased News Media.”) You could walk a block away and be unaware that anything was happening.Mark Peterson for The New York TimesMaybe this is to be expected: Many of the people who might have led mob violence have been either indicted or convicted for their involvement in the Jan. 6 insurrection. And certainly, there remains an acute danger from Trump fanatics acting alone. The way the Trump camp has targeted the daughter of the judge overseeing the Trump case has been particularly unconscionable. Arguing that the daughter’s political work constituted a conflict for her father, people including Greene, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump shared a story featuring her photograph on social media, and Trump went after her in his post-arraignment speech, likely putting her safety at risk.But while Trump still has an obsessive following, he can no longer command the country’s stunned attention, even by getting arrested. Maybe that’s the consolation of an arraignment that doesn’t feel at all momentous.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

    • 125 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Defendant Trump Has the G.O.P. Just Where He Wants It

      by

      It was perhaps inevitable that, with Donald Trump’s historic arraignment taking place in the run-up to Easter Sunday, one of his most zealous disciples, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, would aim to drag Jesus into this mess.The former president “is joining some of the most incredible people in history being arrested,” the MAGA chaos agent blathered to a conservative news outlet just hours before Mr. Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts related to a hush-money deal with a porn star. “Jesus! Jesus was arrested and murdered by the Roman government!” proclaimed Ms. Greene.As a lapsed Southern Baptist, I’ll leave it to the more devout to debate whether this comparison qualifies as outright blasphemy or is merely idiotic. Regardless, it was a perfect distillation of Mr. Trump’s longstanding political refrain and current legal defense: He is the faultless victim of political persecution — a righteous martyr beset on all sides by America-hating, baby-eating Democrats and Deep Staters. In the Gospel According to the Donald, any bad thing he is ever accused of is just more proof that the forces of evil are out to get the MAGA messiah.It’s a great story if you can sustain it. Unless you’re a Republican presidential hopeful not named Donald Trump, in which case being required to shovel this grade of malarkey to please the base is increasingly awkward — at least for anyone hoping to retain a shred of credibility beyond the hard-core MAGAverse.This uncomfortable reality is actually something for every member of the G.O.P. to think about. Again. Because, if Mr. Trump’s prime-time, post-arraignment remarks on Tuesday were any indication, this is going to be a central theme of his third presidential run — one that promises to relegate everyone else in the party, including those considering a 2024 run themselves, to being minor players in this latest, tawdriest season of “The Trump Show.”Tuesday night was Mr. Trump’s first chance to address the criminal charges against him — his first real opportunity to counterpunch — since the New York indictment came down. Safely back in the gilded cocoon of Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by American flags and supporters sporting red hats and campaign signs, he delivered a half-hour battle cry that was painfully on brand: a greatest hits of his witch-hunt grievances interwoven with his dark take on how the country is “going to hell” without him. As he tells it, “all-out nuclear World War III” is just around the corner. “It can happen! We’re not very far away from it!” He also suggested that the investigation into his squirreling away sensitive documents at Mar-a-Lago could somehow lead to his being executed.Precisely the kind of responsible rhetoric one likes to hear from a political leader.It was not one of Mr. Trump’s more compelling speeches. The Mar-a-Lago crowd, while friendly, wasn’t the kind of roaring mass of fans from which Mr. Trump draws energy, and the former president sounded heavily scripted. Even so, the address was impressively offensive in its attacks on the justice system in general and the individuals leading the investigations of Mr. Trump in particular — as well as their families. (Seriously, what was with all the wife bashing?) He sniped about the “racist in reverse” officials out to get him. He went on a bizarre riff about how President Biden had hidden a bunch of documents in Chinatown. And his repeated attacks on the “lunatic” Jack Smith, the special counsel overseeing the federal investigations of Mr. Trump, suggest that whole business is really chafing the former president’s backside.Get ready for more of this magic. As Mr. Trump’s legal troubles heat up, with possibly more indictments to come, these investigations are going to eat at him and distract him. A hefty chunk of his campaign is likely to be an extended whine about his ongoing martyrdom, constantly putting other Republicans in the awkward position of having to defend him. And they won’t really have any choice as he whips his devoted followers into a frenzy over his persecution — and, of course, by extension, theirs.That is certainly what we have seen happening. Republicans have been lining up to trash the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. It was in no way surprising to see Representative Lauren Boebert comparing the indictment of Mr. Trump to the actions of Mussolini and, yes, Hitler. But one might have expected slightly more from Gov. Ron DeSantis, widely regarded as the biggest threat to Mr. Trump’s 2024 ambitions, than his pathetic vow to refuse to assist any effort to extradite Mr. Trump to New York. Weak, Ron. Very weak.A long-shot candidate or two, like Asa Hutchinson, a former governor of Arkansas, may try to distinguish themselves by not smooching Mr. Trump’s backside so sloppily. But this is a risky path that few contenders seem inclined to tread. Having bowed to Mr. Trump so low and for so long, the party has left itself few, if any, good options for dealing with him now.Anyone looking to lead the G.O.P. beyond its Trump era was already at a disadvantage before the charges. Be it Nikki Haley or Mike Pence or Mr. DeSantis, the political world is busy assessing potential 2024 contenders in Trump terms, obsessing over where they fall on the MAGA spectrum and how delicately they are or are not handling the former president.Team Trump, meanwhile, is happy to play the martyr card for all it’s worth. They have been boasting about using the former president’s legal troubles to fund-raise and sign up volunteers.Any day now, look for the campaign to start hawking bracelets asking: WWDTD? (What would Donald Trump do?) Ms. Greene will surely snap up several. What classier, more tasteful Easter present for the MAGA faithful in one’s life?The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

    • 100 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      The Trump Indictment, Annotated: Analyzing the 34 Charges

      by

      The Manhattan district attorney’s office unveiled an indictment on Tuesday charging former President Donald J. Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree, a low-level felony in New York State. The charges are related to reimbursements to Mr. Trump’s former fixer, Michael D. Cohen, for a hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels […] More

    • 163 Shares159 Views

      in Elections

      From Trump to John Edwards, Charges Over Payments Hinge on the Money’s Purpose

      by

      In 2011, a former U.S. senator was charged in a case that resembled the one being pursed against Donald J. Trump. The prosecution did not end in a conviction.Is paying hush money a crime?In most cases, the answer is no. Hush-money agreements, also known as nondisclosure agreements, have long been used by companies and private individuals to avoid litigation and keep embarrassing information confidential. Harvey Weinstein, the former producer convicted of rape, used such agreements for years to conceal his harassment and assault of women.But the question is thornier when it comes to candidates in the midst of political campaigns, and it has not often been posed in federal or New York State courts.As it relates to former President Donald J. Trump and the porn star Stormy Daniels, the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, revealed his answer on Tuesday when he unsealed an indictment of Mr. Trump: A hush-money payment can constitute a crime if made to protect a political candidate.All of the felony counts Mr. Trump is now facing stem from reimbursements to his former fixer, Michael D. Cohen, for paying $130,000 to Ms. Daniels in exchange for her silence about the liaison she said she had with Mr. Trump.Having charged Mr. Trump with falsifying business records, Mr. Bragg’s office will have to navigate complicated legal terrain. A conviction would hinge on proving that reimbursements to Mr. Cohen were falsely disguised as legal fees to conceal another crime: perhaps a violation of election laws. The indictment did not, however, charge Mr. Trump with an election law violation; Mr. Cohen has admitted to committing one with the payment to Ms. Daniels.The case bears some similarities to the prosecution of a former United States senator, John Edwards of North Carolina, who was charged in 2011 with federal campaign finance violations for payments to help a mistress during his own presidential run in 2008. The case ended without a conviction.Federal and state campaign laws require reporting of campaign-related payments, and if they are made by third parties coordinating with the candidate, such as Mr. Cohen, they are subject to certain limits. Mr. Cohen’s payment to Ms. Daniels before the 2016 presidential election was well beyond the federal legal limit.The indictment of Mr. Trump charged him with 34 counts of falsifying business records in reimbursing Mr. Cohen for the hush money. Mr. Trump, who is once more seeking the Republican nomination for president, has denied sleeping with Ms. Daniels; called the prosecution by Mr. Bragg, a Democrat, political; and said he has done nothing wrong. Appearing in a State Supreme Court on Tuesday, he pleaded not guilty.On its own, falsifying business records is a misdemeanor in New York State — but it can be charged as a felony if it is intended to conceal another crime. In this case, the indictment accuses him of falsifying business records; an accompanying statement of facts says Mr. Trump orchestrated a scheme to violate election laws.Proving that element will most likely hinge on whether the hush money is interpreted to have been paid in the service of Mr. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign or for personal reasons, such as shielding his wife, Melania, and youngest son, Barron, from Ms. Daniels’s story..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.That is the sort of transaction that Mr. Trump’s lawyers say took place.“This was a personal expenditure, not a campaign expenditure. Had it been a campaign expenditure, he would have used campaign funds,” one of the lawyers, Joe Tacopina, said on CNN on Sunday.Mr. Trump’s team has pointed to the failed prosecution of Mr. Edwards to bolster its argument that the payment to Ms. Daniels was not a campaign contribution.In that case, prosecutors charged Mr. Edwards with campaign finance violations related to payments that two wealthy campaign donors made for living expenses of Mr. Edwards’s mistress, Rielle Hunter, who had given birth to his child, and for travel expenses as she traveled to evade the media during his 2008 presidential campaign.But Mr. Edwards’s lawyers won an acquittal on one count and a mistrial on five other charges, which prosecutors then dismissed, by arguing that the payments were not related to the election. His lawyers showed that one of the donors continued making payments to help Ms. Hunter after Mr. Edwards suspended his campaign. And he had another convincing motive to keep Ms. Hunter and her child a secret: His wife, Elizabeth, was dying of cancer.Mr. Bragg’s office might be able to make a stronger case in arguing that the payment to Ms. Daniels was made to influence the election on Mr. Trump’s behalf rather than for personal reasons.For one thing, Ms. Daniels had tried to sell her story of sleeping with Mr. Trump for at least five years, but he had never before agreed to pay for her silence. Mr. Cohen did so weeks before the election, and days after the so-called “Access Hollywood” tape — in which Mr. Trump was heard talking about groping women — was made public, potentially tanking Mr. Trump’s campaign.For another, Mr. Trump met with Mr. Cohen and David Pecker, the publisher of The National Enquirer, at the beginning of his campaign in August 2015 to discuss a strategy for bottling up negative stories. And Mr. Pecker’s company paid to suppress the story of another woman, the Playboy model Karen McDougal, less than three months before Ms. Daniels received her payment.Both Mr. Pecker and Mr. Cohen have testified before the grand jury that indicted Mr. Trump, and would be expected to do so at a trial.Jeff Tsai, a San Francisco lawyer and former federal prosecutor who worked on the Edwards case, said in an interview that because of the “elasticity” of whether money is primarily spent to help a campaign or for personal reasons, the facts in a particular case are extremely important.“Jurors will have to decide as to whether or not these funds, putting some of the salacious details aside, are fundamentally being used for campaign purposes,” Mr. Tsai said.One successful case brought by the Justice Department on the theory that hush money payments can violate election laws was against Mr. Cohen himself, who pleaded guilty to campaign finance charges in 2018 in connection with the Daniels and McDougal payments, while saying his actions had been directed by Mr. Trump. But because Mr. Cohen did not go to trial, the prosecution’s case was not tested before a judge or jury.Kate Christobek More