U.S. President Donald Trump is using money donated to his re-election campaign and the Republican National Committee to pay for his lawyers in the probe of alleged Russian interference in the U.S. election, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
Following Reuters exclusive report on Tuesday, CNN reported that the Republican National Committee paid in August more than $230,000 to cover some of Trump's legal fees related to the probe.
RNC spokesperson Cassie Smedile confirmed to Reuters that Trump's lead lawyer, John Dowd, received $100,000 from the RNC and that the RNC also paid $131,250 to the Constitutional Litigation and Advocacy Group, the law firm where Jay Sekulow, another of Trump's lawyers, is a partner.
It should be noted that they are still soliciting donations on the Trump reelection website.
That means that the party of Ronald "Tear down this wall" Reagan is donating money to help the campaign of the current president fight charges that they may have colluded with the Russians to steal this last election.
Just let that sink in for a moment.
However according to Law Newz there is nothing necessarily illegal about this:
“I have a hard time envisioning the FEC having a problem with this,” Paul S. Ryan told Law Newz in a phone interview. He’s the Vice President of Policy & Litigation at Common Cause, a watchdog group. He said these expenditures are probably legal, especially after the passage of the “Cromnibus” bill in December 2014, which relaxed campaign finance rules. In short, yes, politicians can use campaign funds to pay for legal frees arising from an election.
One major restriction is that such money cannot be used for personal bills. Ryan referenced the legal battle surrounding Ex-Sen. Larry Craig, who used campaign funds to defend himself after his arrest for an incident at an airport report. The courts ruled that he illegally used that money for personal use. But since the Russia probe arises from allegations linked to the election, Ryan said the Trump team has a strong argument to show that this is a campaign-related matter.
Keeping that last part in mind there is also this bit of news courtesy of Raw Story:
After revelations that President Donald Trump is using funds from his campaign and the Republican National Committee to pay for his legal defense, news broke that the RNC also paid almost $200,000 to lawyers representing Donald Trump, Jr.
According to the Wall Street Journal‘s Rebecca Ballhaus, the RNC paid $166,000 to Trump Jr.’s personal lawyer Alan Futerfas, and paid another $30,000 to Washington, D.C.-based firm Williams & Jensen. Both payments took place in the month of August.
Futerfas, Ballhaus pointed out, received a $50,000 payout a few weeks before Trump Jr.’s infamous Trump Tower meeting with Russian operatives last June.
In total, the RNC and the Trump campaign combined have shelled out at least $500,000 to defend the president and Trump Jr.
I would assume that since the Trump Tower meeting happened during the election, that they are still on relatively firm legal ground. Relatively firm.
However since this is supposedly a billionaire family, one might wonder why they do not pay their own fucking legal bills and leave the money donated to the RNC by hardworking Americans where it belongs?
Oh, and remember that promise to donate the left over inaugural funds to charity?
Yeah, I'm going to assume that the money is now lining the pockets of Trump's legal team.
Source http://ift.tt/2xhydBv
