# Trump, PACs, and legal fees
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843
**Category:** Politics & Elections
**Tags:** trump
**Created:** [July 31, 2023, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843 "2023-07-31T00:22:19Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2023, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/21 "2023-08-02T15:10:33Z")
> [@DWMarch](#):
>
> Did Trump spend 40 million dollars on lawyers or was it 20 million? So hard to keep track of 20 million bucks sometimes!
Just a bookkeeping error of $20 million. Happens to me all the time.
The other part of the earlier report seems accurate, however: that he was down to under $4 million in the June reports.
That’s why he reportedly had to beg, borrow or steal (tick one) $60 million from the “independent” super-pac
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### Author:  [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2023, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/22 "2023-08-02T17:55:22Z")
But he’s a _billionaire_ – just ask him. $60,000,000 should be chump change.
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### Author:  [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2023, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/23 "2023-08-02T18:25:03Z")
In my limited experience with PACs (for local issues), you can use the money you have for campaign-related stuff and for donating to other PACs or to non-profits. We had like $300 left at the end of one of our campaigns and wished to close it out, so we gave the $300 to a local veteran’s group. Someone had just given us $500 before we closed it out but we could NOT give him his money back (or $300 of it).
Nobody really needs to ask for a refund. The second PAC can legally give money to the first PAC.
As for paying for someone’s legal defense fund, that doesn’t sound legal. But as others have pointed out (and Colbert’s lawyer, Trevor Potter), PAC laws are sketchy.
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### Author:  [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2023, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/24 "2023-08-04T05:13:39Z")
One thing about this mess is that one of the PACs is a Super-PAC and one is an ordinary PAC. There are different rules for each and those play into this deal. I’m afraid I don’t remember the specifics, but they were spelled out in a WaPo article that I’m too lazy to hunt down.
Also Trump has more legal entanglements than the well-publicized indictments. He’s suing several people and organizations, including CNN and Michael Cohen, for example. I’m sure someone somewhere has a database with the details of all his legal activities. I expect that database is huge.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2023, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/25 "2023-08-04T12:40:13Z")
The federal district court has dismissed Trump’s defamation suit against Trump. Held that CNN’s statement that Trump’s «stolen election » was an example of a Big Lie was a matter of political opinion.
> **[A federal judge has dismissed Trump's defamation case against CNN over 'the...](https://www.npr.org/2023/07/30/1190983801/a-federal-judge-has-dismissed-trumps-defamation-case-against-cnn-over-the-big-li)**
>
> The former president claimed that references in news articles or by the network's hosts to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election as "the Big Lie" was tantamount to comparing him to Adolf Hitler.
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### Author:  [@Akaj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Akaj)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2023, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/26 "2023-08-04T13:29:47Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#):
>
> The federal district court has dismissed **Trump’s defamation suit against Trump.**
Bolding mine.
I know this was just a typo, but you know it’s only a matter of time before this litigious asshole sues himself.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2023, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/27 "2023-08-04T13:51:05Z")
D’oh!
posting too early in the morning.
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### Author:  [@flurb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flurb)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2023, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/28 "2023-08-04T14:11:09Z")
> [@Akaj](#):
>
> I know this was just a typo, but you know it’s only a matter of time before this litigious asshole sues himself.
Already happened:
_By February 2007, Trump Mortgage stopped paying rent to its landlord, 40 Wall Street LLC—which Trump owned, through the Trump Organization. What happened next? One Trump company took the other to court. In July 2007, 40 Wall Street LLC petitioned New York County Civil Court for $57,367.95 (the unpaid rent plus $450 in legal fees) and asked for permission to evict Trump Mortgage from its 25th-floor space. After Trump’s Trump Mortgage LLC failed to respond to the petition, Judge Debra Samuels ruled in favor of the Trump-owned 40 Wall Street LLC, and the struggling mortgage company, which went out of business in 2007, was booted out of Trump’s own building._
> **[Donald Trump once sued his own business](https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/08/trump-files-the-time-donald-sued-himself/)**
>
> He won! (And lost.)
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [September 23, 2023, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/29 "2023-09-23T15:38:47Z")
Open Secrets, which tracks donations and expenses by politicians, has recently published an article which states that Trump’s PAC has spent $44 million to pay lawyers to represent witnesses in the various cases against Trump.
That raises two issues: (1) is Trump witness tampering, by offering legal counsel to ensure the witness stays “loyal” to Trump’s view of the legal case; (2) is this a political expense? Is a PAC jsut the candidate’s piggy bank for whatever he wants.
The article suggests that Jack Smith is looking into it, and it’s already coming up in the Georgia trial: are the lawyers Trump pays for acting in the witness’s best legal interests, or are they really acting for Trump?
> **[Prosecutors allege pressure tactics after Trump’s political operation paid...](https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2023/09/prosecutors-allege-pressure-tactics-after-trumps-political-operation-paid-over-44-million-to-witness-lawyers/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=twit%2Fprosecutors-allege-pressure-tactics-after-trumps-political-operation-paid-over-44-million-to-witness-lawyers%2F09%2F22%2F23)**
>
> Donald Trump’s political operation spent over $44 million on lawyers and law firms that have represented witnesses and codefendants in his legal cases since 2020 — accounting for about half of its legal expenses during that time.
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### Author:  [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)
#### Post date: [September 23, 2023, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/30 "2023-09-23T19:32:38Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#):
>
> (1) is Trump witness tampering, by offering legal counsel to ensure the witness stays “loyal” to Trump’s view of the legal case; (2) is this a political expense? Is a PAC jsut the candidate’s piggy bank for whatever he wants.
For (1), there are prominent examples where someone with a Trump attorney had a chance to speak to a real attorney and immediately decided they were better off cooperating. So I’d say yes although IANAL.
For (2), I don’t think Trump cares how he is supposed to spend money and regards anyone trying to tell him what he can and cannot do with “his” money as election interference.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2023, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/31 "2023-09-28T21:55:20Z")
The Trump Piggy PAC is starting to lose weight:
> **[Trump’s Sprawling Legal Defense Effort Comes Under Strain](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/28/us/politics/trump-lawyers-pac.html?unlocked_article_code=5irsebN8mKLx-Muwuy4OBQmo2Sa4q_Eyel5ad3EDUPIqa76yaniPqLeugfVSoGd2sD2n9xGznwM7pBDG27pVYxBYd2jCKzPq7P4euq4bHbyMLWXI2X5bv9m-BvDompFa9Iewbhscl_TBAX6pFkuJ1FiVo9CuwCP80gVODzkkaSkN_A_Rr_8-0y5BvWLWgH0ILeBa8u_p7b03SKVkO7YQ4J6-hlqG4gogwMRYvkSNYB4X0JGLLJflyhqM4QusC2ciWpyDDdHpTbViU-yjtCYeL7-xemZUvcng9wlldrCZBB8dyuQ__VffK0ccU5OpERpRcVV4NzZxFY4ciVg0Lwequg&smid=url-share)**
>
> Former President Donald Trump’s team has found lawyers for others caught up in his prosecutions and has paid many of their legal bills. That arrangement may not be sustainable.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2023, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/32 "2023-09-28T22:51:48Z")
I wonder if they’ll name a new version of a Ponzi Scheme after Trump.
In a Ponzi Scheme, you bring in investors by promising them a return on their investment, then bring in a new group of investors, and use their investment to pay off the first group, then use the first group’s successful gains as proof that the investment is sound, which helps bring in a third group whose investment pays off the second group, and so on. Until eventually the money runs out and the last people in get nothing.
In a Trump Scheme, you hire lawyers to defend you, and those lawyers use underhanded means in that defense, and once that is revealed those lawyers get in trouble, so you hire new lawyers to defend those lawyers, who likewise get themselves in trouble in their efforts to defend the original lawyers, who then need their own lawyers, and so on. All of this funded by gullible folks being spun a sob story of persecution by the Deep State, and only their donations can Save America, etc. Eventually the Trump Scheme runs out of money too.
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### Author:  [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)
#### Post date: [October 2, 2023, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/33 "2023-10-02T16:35:30Z")
> [@Akaj](#):
>
> I know this was just a typo, but you know it’s only a matter of time before this litigious asshole sues himself.
Its probably the only way he can win in court these days. On the other hand I could also imagine it resulting in the judge sanctioning both parties.
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### Author:  [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)
#### Post date: [October 3, 2023, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/34 "2023-10-03T02:44:41Z")
> [@Akaj](#):
>
> I know this was just a typo, but you know it’s only a matter of time before this litigious asshole sues himself.
> **[Donald Trump once sued his own business](https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/08/trump-files-the-time-donald-sued-himself/)**
>
> He won! (And lost.)
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### Author:  [@flurb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flurb)
#### Post date: [October 3, 2023, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/35 "2023-10-03T03:05:40Z")
Beat ya by five post and two months. 😁
> [@Trump, PACs, and legal fees](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/28):
>
> Already happened: By February 2007, Trump Mortgage stopped paying rent to its landlord, 40 Wall Street LLC—which Trump owned, through the Trump Organization. What happened next? One Trump company took the other to court. In July 2007, 40 Wall Street LLC petitioned New York County Civil Court for $57,367.95 (the unpaid rent plus $450 in legal fees) and asked for permission to evict Trump Mortgage from its 25th-floor space. After Trump’s Trump Mortgage LLC failed to respond to the petition, Judg…
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [February 18, 2024, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/36 "2024-02-18T01:34:50Z")
Article gives an update on Trump’s fund-raising; indications appear to be that his grift is slowing down.
> **[Trump's legal bills appear to be piling up for donors, according to election...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-biden-fec-election-expenses-1.7101507)**
>
> Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump's fundraising slowed in the last three months of 2023 and his legal fees appeared to drag on the finances behind his election effort, according to fresh disclosures submitted to the Federal Election...
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### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [February 18, 2024, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/37 "2024-02-18T02:02:27Z")
Why donate to Trumps PAC when you can just send your cash directly to Jean Carroll or the State of New York? Don’t forget to save some coins- you will need them to send to Trumps legal team, or to whoever he defames next.
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### Author:  [@flurb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flurb)
#### Post date: [February 18, 2024, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/38 "2024-02-18T04:09:54Z")
One of the theories I’ve seen about why Trump is taking over more direct control of the RNC is that – whereas it would be legally problematic for his PACs to help pay the civil judgments against him (as opposed to paying his legal bills, which is permissible) – the RNC _could_ do so. Of course, the RNC doesn’t have $400 million, but it gives him another piggy bank he can potentially crack into.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [February 18, 2024, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/39 "2024-02-18T04:51:55Z")
PACs are virtually unrestricted in their activities. Politicians rarely make laws that they would have to follow, and then they don’t enforce them.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [February 18, 2024, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-pacs-and-legal-fees/987843/40 "2024-02-18T18:25:06Z")
> [@flurb](#):
>
> One of the theories I’ve seen about why Trump is taking over more direct control of the RNC is that – whereas it would be legally problematic for his PACs to help pay the civil judgments against him (as opposed to paying his legal bills, which is permissible) – the RNC _could_ do so. Of course, the RNC doesn’t have $400 million, but it gives him another piggy bank he can potentially crack into.
Yep. Asa Hutchinson (remember him) is raising it as a concern.
Given his strong performance in the primaries, I’m sure his views will be given great weight by the GOP.
[https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/4474535-asa-hutchinson-rnc-should-pledge-not-to-pay-trump-legal-fees/](https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/4474535-asa-hutchinson-rnc-should-pledge-not-to-pay-trump-legal-fees/)
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