President Trump’s political operation dedicated about $277 million from September through mid-October to help Republican midterm candidates, a staggering sum that has given the party an upper hand financially as it clings to full control of Congress.
That spending, unheard-of for a term-limited president, is an unbridled expression of Mr. Trump’s power. Immediately upon being elected for the second time, his aides began soliciting checks at dinners where companies and donors angling for influence could buy face time with the leader of the free world, sometimes for a million dollars a head. His main super PAC, MAGA Inc., has raised about $473 million since his election — and now Mr. Trump is putting that money to work.
The money has financed an explosion of Republican spending that Democrats have had no answer for, even as they aim to take advantage of an otherwise favorable political environment.
Around Labor Day, Mr. Trump’s three outside groups started running advertisements in 24 states that included some of the most competitive Senate and House races. Plenty of the seats, notably, were in red areas and have become competitive for Democrats because of Mr. Trump’s unpopularity. In recent days, the Trump-tied super PACs have drastically increased their spending on ads through Meta and Google.
The New York Times previously reported that two of these super PACs were effectively outgrowths of MAGA Inc. And new campaign-finance filings posted on Tuesday evening from those groups, called No Going Back PAC Inc. and Safety and Affordability PAC Inc., show that they were almost entirely financed with $225 million in transfers from MAGA Inc. through Oct. 14.
Mr. Trump’s three allied super PACs together held about $181 million on hand as of Oct. 14, the filings showed, meaning that they could spend heavily to help Republicans over the final three weeks.
Between Oct. 15 and Election Day, those three affiliated super PACs are slated to air roughly $99 million worth of ads, according to the media-tracking firm AdImpact. That most likely puts the Trump operation’s total spending for the midterms above $300 million.
Mr. Trump — who some Republicans had doubted would direct his super PAC to spend this much on the midterms — proudly pointed on Tuesday afternoon to the money from his operation.
“I have spent, or will be spending, over 400 Million Dollars by Election Day,” he wrote on Truth Social. “More than 300 Million Dollars has already been spent on Advertising, Direct and Indirect Voter Contact, Rallies, Rally Arenas, Telerallies, Get Out the Vote Programs, Election Integrity, and more.” (He seemed to be suggesting that the groups’ money was his, a claim that has raised legal scrutiny.)
The biggest donors to Mr. Trump’s main super PAC since Election Day in 2024 have been the crypto company Foris Dax, which operates Crypto.com; the Wisconsin roofing billionaire Diane Hendricks; and the pro-Israel megadonor Miriam Adelson, according to a New York Times review of MAGA Inc. records.
But the operation has raised money from a wide group of donors, some of whom have business before the Trump administration. Over 100 contributors have given at least $1 million to MAGA Inc., according to the Times review.
Shane Goldmacher contributed reporting.
The post Trump Wields an Unprecedented $277 Million in Final Midterm Stretch appeared first on New York Times.
