Trump, staring down GOP rivals, raised $14.5 million in first quarter

Former president Donald Trump, seeking to fend off challengers for the Republican presidential nomination, raised about $14.5 million for his campaign in the first three months of 2023 and another $4.3 million for a post-presidency group he has used to pay advisers and stage events, his campaign said on Saturday.

The bulk of the campaign’s cash infusion came via a joint fundraising committee that directs money to the former president’s various groups. The Trump campaign said it had nearly $14 million on hand at the end of March.

The sum is markedly lower than his haul in the first quarter of 2019, when Trump raised more than $30 million as he was gearing up for a reelection bid from his perch in the White House. The falloff, combined with strong numbers posted by some of his rivals, could galvanize those looking for an alternative to the former president, even as his team says fundraising accelerated following his indictment in New York, virtually making up the difference from four years ago.

The indictment came on March 30, and the filing only covers cash raised through the end of that month, not fully capturing the surge in small-dollar fundraising that Trump’s team touted following the Manhattan district attorney’s move to bring charges against him.

Some of the party’s most deep-pocketed donors have gravitated to other presidential options, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is laying the foundation for a presidential run, and Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, who recently launched an exploratory committee and was huddling with donors this weekend at a retreat in Charleston.

It remains to be seen, however, how much a financial edge will matter in efforts to topple Trump. One person who works with major donors, and who spoke on the condition of anonymity to address fundraising dynamics candidly, pointed to a “disconnect between big donors and the base, which is even more clear this cycle than in the previous one.”

In a sign of Trump’s continued appeal with small-dollar donors, nearly 99 percent of contributions in the first three months of the year were of $200 or less, the campaign said. The average donation was about $35.

Trump’s campaign detailed its finances in a filing on Saturday with the Federal Election Commission. The campaign said on Saturday that it had raised about $15 million in the two weeks after the indictment, nearly equivalent to its haul throughout the entire first quarter. The campaign also said that nearly 25 percent of those contributions came from new donors.

Fundraising solicitations show how Trump’s team has sought to capitalize on his legal jeopardy. On March 31 alone, no fewer than nine emails referred to the indictment in seeking cash from supporters, with such subject lines such as “RUMORED DETAILS OF MY ARREST” and “This will BACKFIRE.”

A super PAC supporting Trump’s bid won’t disclose its finances until midyear. Groups backing DeSantis will also report to the FEC at that time.

Beyond Trump, the only other candidate to file a quarterly campaign report was Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and U.N. ambassador. Her campaign said she had raised more than $11 million since announcing her bid in mid-February, but a filing late Saturday showed a much smaller haul of only about $5 million directly into her campaign committee. She raised several million more into other committees.

Asa Hutchinson, the former governor of Arkansas, announced his bid this month, after the end of the quarterly reporting period. Only in recent days did Scott launch his exploratory committee, though he has nearly $22 million parked in his Senate committee. A pro-Scott super PAC, largely funded by the tech magnate Larry Ellison, is also sitting on $13 million.

In announcing her haul earlier this month, Haley’s campaign made a point of noting that she had received 70,000 donations from all 50 states, most of them under $200.

“To raise that kind of money the first time out is very impressive,” said David H. Wilkins, a former speaker of the South Carolina House of Representatives who chaired the finance committee for Sen. Lindsey O. Graham’s 2015 bid for the GOP presidential nomination. “It’s a clear sign that she resonates with folks and that this race is wide open.”

Haley has been raising funds at events throughout the country. At a dinner last month in Phoenix, guests were asked to contribute $16,600, distributed among Haley’s various groups, according to an invitation. People who attended the dinner, at the home of a prominent lobbyist, said she touted her foreign policy credentials and assailed the Chinese government.

Money isn’t expected to be a problem for DeSantis. A super PAC that is expected to serve as the approved outside spending vehicle for his presidential bid announced in early April that it had raised $30 million since its launch the previous month. That group, which can accept unlimited sums from individual and corporate donors, won’t detail its numbers to the FEC until the summer. An allied group only accepting up to the $3,300 individual contribution cap, in anticipation of transferring those funds to a potential DeSantis campaign committee, will also report in the middle of the year.

Meanwhile, DeSantis had more than $85 million sitting in his state-level committee at the end of March, mostly leftover funds from his reelection campaign last year. There are restrictions on how those funds can be used because they were raised under different rules than the ones governing presidential campaign committees. A likely scenario is that they will be transferred to the pro-DeSantis super PAC, which can support his candidacy but is required to operate independently from his campaign.