RNC co-chair on how much fundraising will go to Trump legal fees: ‘We’ll wait and see’

Republican National Committee (RNC) co-chair Lara Trump did not say how much fundraising will go to former President Trump’s legal fees.

The former president quickly fundraised off the jury’s verdict last week, raising about $35 million in the first day after he was found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records. Lara Trump said Sunday that the RNC raised $70 million in the first 48 hours after the verdict was read.

CNN’s Kasie Hunt later pressed her on how much of that fundraising will go to paying Trump’s legal fees. He still has three other ongoing criminal cases, where he faces 54 remaining criminal charges across all of them.

“Well, everybody has an option whenever they donate to our joint fundraising agreement to opt out of. It is a very small percentage of the money that we take in. And so I would have to say we’ll wait and see what is necessary in the future,” Lara Trump said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“Obviously, this has been a very costly thing, not just for Donald Trump and his campaign but for America. The stain that this has put on our country, I think, is abominable. And we’ll do whatever we need to do to ensure that the right thing happens on November 5, because that’s when the ultimate verdict will be rendered,” she added.

Trump’s campaign spent nearly $30 million in legal fees during the second half of 2022. His fundraising agreement with the RNC sends donations to his campaign and a political action committee covering his legal bills before they reach the party itself.

Earlier this year, a resolution in the RNC that would have banned the committee from footing Trump’s legal fees failed to gain enough support to bring it to a vote. Lara Trump, who stepped into her leadership role earlier this year, has also said that she will spend “every single penny” of RNC funds to help her father-in-law get elected this November.