Donald Trump tells donors to help Republicans win the US Senate — by giving his own political committees money
- Who will control the US Senate is still unknown as results from Arizona and Nevada continue trickling in.
- Donald Trump blasted out a Senate-focused fundraising plea to his supporters on Wednesday night.
As control of the US Senate remains undecided, former President Donald Trump on Wednesday night blasted out a fundraising text message.
"We need to WIN BACK our SENATE Majority!! We can still WIN in Nevada, Arizona & Georgia!" reads Trump's message, which encourages supporters to donate money to the "America Defense Fund."
But Republican US Senate candidates such as Herschel Walker in Georgia, Adam Laxalt in Nevada, and Blake Masters in Arizona might never see a dime of it.
Fine print in Trump's message indicates that contributions will actually go to the Save America Joint Fundraising Committee, which has no direct affiliation with any 2022 Republican candidate and instead benefits two political action committees Trump himself leads: the Make America Great Again PAC and Save America, according to FEC records.
Trump's PACs could choose to use some of that money to boost the remaining GOP Senate candidates.
Or not.
Trump and his team alone control this money. And to date, according to Federal Election Commission records, Save America and Make America Great Again have together spent only a small fraction of the more than $124 million they've together raised this election cycle to directly benefit Republican congressional candidates through direct campaign contributions, political advertisements, and other communications.
Trump has spent much of his PAC's money for his own purposes — from travel costs, to mounting legal expenses, to staging his beloved rallies. The rest of it — nearly $70 million in Save America alone, per federal records — remains unspent.
Some of the biggest candidate-related spending Trump's Save America PAC has done this year? It didn't benefit Walker, but instead, another Georgia candidate — former Sen. David Perdue, who lost in a Republican primary against Gov. Brian Kemp.
On Tuesday, Kemp, one of Trump's least favorite Republicans for refusing to support the former president's erroneous claims that he won Georgia during the 2020 presidential election, won re-election Tuesday by defeating Democrat Stacey Abrams.
And as the predicted "red wave" failed to materialize on Election Day, Trump seemed more focused on his own political prospects that those of Republican congressional hopefuls.
On Tuesday night, the Save America Joint Fundraising Committee blasted another fundraising missive with the message: "DO YOU WANT PRESIDENT TRUMP TO RUN IN 2024?"
Trump is teasing an expected 2024 presidential campaign announcement — something he's flirted with for months —for early next week.
"I'm going to be making a very big announcement on Tuesday, November 15 at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida," he said.