Late Monday, after days of backlash over more than $10 million in taxpayer-funded political advertising, President Trump posted on Truth Social that he had “decided to do the Patriotic Ads, among others, and pay for them myself, and with money I raised for MAGA, Inc.” The announcement fixes the funding source that drew the complaints. According to campaign finance lawyers, it swaps in one that federal law also prohibits, as Common Dreams reported.
The mechanism matters. Super PACs may raise unlimited sums from corporations and executives precisely because they are supposed to operate independently of candidates and officeholders. “After charging taxpayers $10 million for thinly-veiled campaign ads, Trump now says he’ll have his super PAC pay instead. One problem: Federal law prohibits officeholders from controlling a super PAC or directing its spending,” said Brendan Fischer, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center. The CLC filed a complaint last month arguing that Trump and his allies have openly indicated he controls MAGA Inc., in violation of the Federal Election Campaign Act.
“President Trump’s repeated assertions that he controls a super PAC show that he has committed a clear-cut violation of campaign finance law,” said Saurav Ghosh, CLC’s director of federal campaign finance reform. “No federal officeholder or candidate is allowed to direct the money raised or spent by a super PAC.” Monday’s post adds another such assertion to the record.
The ads at issue ran weeks before the November midterms and were paid for out of the Department of Homeland Security’s budget; CNN and MS NOW aired them and took heavy criticism for it. Spent-versus-allocated accounting differs by tally: Common Dreams puts more than $10 million in tax dollars behind the recent spots, while an earlier accounting found $20 million allocated to at least 13 spots through Customs and Border Protection, a DHS agency. “These campaign ads never should have run on the taxpayer’s dime to begin with. Clearly wrong. Clearly illegal,” Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) said after Trump’s announcement.
Who bought the ad time
An analysis by the Center for American Progress Action Fund breaks down where MAGA Inc.’s money comes from: 20 crypto companies and executives gave $88.2 million; four AI and data-center donors gave $37 million, an average of $9.25 million apiece; six fossil fuel donors gave $29.75 million; two health insurance and benefits companies gave $6 million; and 47 nursing home companies and executives gave nearly $10 million. That is roughly $171 million from 79 named donors or donor groups whose industries all have business before the administration — a donor base assembled for a super PAC the president says pays for his ads.
“President Trump first ran for office promising to drain the swamp—a catchall phrase that meant rooting out corruption, conflicts of interest, and other insider dealing—but large wealthy and corporate donors to his super PAC appear to be benefiting from the official actions he is taking as president,” the analysis stated. It advised viewers of the coming ad wave to ask “who is funding those ads and how are they benefiting.”
The CLC complaint now tests the premise on which super PAC law rests: that independence is a real condition, not a label. When an officeholder announces in writing that a PAC spending millions on his behalf is spending money he raised, at his direction, the open question is no longer whether the statute prohibits it. It says so plainly. The question is whether anyone will make the prohibition stick before the ads finish airing.