In the past couple weeks, President Donald Trump has worked tirelessly in an effort to discredit the election results, as Vice President Joe Biden has pulled ahead in many states. Trump’s campaign team has recently bombarded his supporters with emails, with ‘critical requests’ for donations to Trump’s Official Election Defense Fund.

These emails were blatantly pressuring his supporters, saying things like, “We are keeping up the fight against the Democrats’ attacks on a fair election, but we can’t do it without YOU.” While these claims about the “Democrats stealing the election” and “mailing in ballots increases voter fraud” have both been disputed, the president continues to push these claims onto the public recklessly.

When reading the fine print of these emails, it becomes apparent that most of the donations that Trump will receive will go towards other priorities, not directly to the Election Defense Fund. A donor would have to give over $8,000 before any money goes toward the fund, and any amount below that will go toward “Save America,” which is a Trump leadership political action committee, PAC, as well as the Republican National Committee, RNC.

In America, these types of leadership PACs are set up by political figures to spend money on other candidates and pay for personal expenses like travel and hotel stays. These regulations would allow Trump and the RNC to funnel these donations into other political causes and campaigns, like the two January Senate races in Georgia. These races are likely to determine control of the Senate and are set to rank among the most expensive political races in U.S. history. 

Scrolling down Trump’s solicitation website, the top of the page greets readers with a banner that reads “OFFICIAL ELECTION DEFENSE FUND” followed by “CONTRIBUTE NOW.” The fine print shows that donations are split between “Save America,” which gets around 60% of the money, while the RNC claims the other 40%. This is where the legalities come in because none of the money goes into the “recount” committee fund until Save America reaches the legal contribution limit of $5,000. For example, if a Trump donor gave $500, only $300 would go to Save America, while $200 would go to the RNC, while nothing would go to the election defense fund before a donor would donate over $8,000.

It is important to be up-front with donors because, at first glance, this type of solicitation looks severely misleading. Donald Trump seems to be taking advantage of his supporters, assuming they will not read the fine print and donate small amounts to him, knowing that this money will not go directly to where it is advertised to go. Trump knows that he can “give his approval” for just about anything, and his supporters will buy into it, which is a prime example of this strategy, unfortunately working to his benefit. It is terrifying to have someone in power who is this comfortable with misleading the public for his own gain, and there is hardly any way that one can twist this story to make it seem ethical.