Trump demanded $25m campaign donation to have lunch with businessman

Donald Trump revealed he demanded a $25 million (£20 million) campaign donation to have lunch with a businessman as he warned wealthy donors that Joe Biden would raise their taxes.

The former president and Republican 2024 candidate has reportedly been pressuring the GOP’s wealthiest donors to dig deep as he seeks to narrow the Democrats’ huge fundraising advantage.

Mr Trump, 77, courted some of the country’s biggest donors at a high-end hotel on New York’s Upper East Side earlier this month when he warned that Mr Biden would let Trump-era tax cuts on wealthy individuals and corporations expire in 2025.

He shared an anecdote with the group about a businessman who had recently offered $1 million (£780,000) to Mr Trump’s 2024 campaign and asked to have lunch with him.

Some of the donors present told the Washington Post that Mr Trump responded: “I’m not having lunch - you’ve got to make it $25 million.”

Mr Trump added that he had warned another businessman, who had typically given sums of around $2 million to $3 million to Republicans, that he would not be “very happy” unless he gave a contribution of around $25 million or $50 million.

‘A worthwhile investment’

In his pitch at New York’s Pierre Hotel, Mr Trump argued the generous donations were a worthwhile investment, arguing Mr Biden’s re-election would leave the group facing “the biggest tax increase in history”.

“So whatever you guys can do, I appreciate it,” he told them, according to the Washington Post.

It is just the latest instance of Mr Trump demanding huge sums from deep-pocketed donors as he faces mounting legal bills over a string of criminal and civil cases and struggles to sustain fundraising from his grassroots base.

Earlier this month, it was reported Mr Trump asked for oil and gas industry executives to donate $1 billion (£782 million), telling them it was a good “deal” for them if he retook the White House and scrapped Biden-era environmental regulations.

Mr Trump has joked on other occasions that he did not spend more than 10 minutes with a donor unless they gave $10 million, the newspaper reported.

Legal experts said Mr Trump’s requests, tied together with favourable policies such as tax cuts and other incentives, had tested the boundaries of campaign finance laws.

Regulations dictate candidates can only request contributions of up to $3,300 for their campaign.

Candidates can appear at events for super PACs backing them, which do not have the same impositions, although they cannot explicitly ask for money at those donor-attended events.

Mr Trump’s own team is said to have been left surprised by the scale of his fundraising expectations.

However, his advisers have argued that he regularly makes the same policy promises on the campaign trail that he is reported to have made behind closed doors to wealthy donors.

There is nothing to suggest that Mr Trump has directly tied a policy promise to a specific donation.

Karoline Leavitt, the national campaign press secretary for Mr Trump, said: “As Joe Biden’s backers in Hollywood and Silicon Valley are withholding their support for Biden’s failing campaign, donors across the country are maximising their efforts to re-elect President Trump because they realise we cannot afford another four years of Joe Biden’s terrible policies.”

Mr Biden’s campaign has held a number of star-studded events to grow its war chest, with former President Barack Obama, George Clooney and Julia Roberts due to host a major fundraiser in Los Angeles next month.

Mr Trump, whose 2016 presidential win was powered by a small-dollar grassroots, previously railed against the role of big donors whom he argued “have total control over those politicians”.

However, with the Biden operation reporting around $60 million (£47 million) more cash on hand than his own, Mr Trump has taken an active role in courting donors, often hosting them at his Mar-a-Lago Club.

“True. I’m begging for your money,” Mr Trump is reported to have joked to the crowd at a fundraiser hosted by an oil executive in Texas last week.