Houston Chronicle: Texans donated $8.9M to Trump as he peddled baseless ‘Stop the Steal’ election fraud claims

WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump raised more than $8.9 million in Texas in the weeks after losing the election that he claimed, without evidence, was stolen from him.

It was part of an unprecedented fundraising push by the former president’s campaign in the final weeks of 2020 as it asked supporters for cash to help fund Trump’s legal fight to overturn the results, or “stop the steal” as he branded it.

Campaign finance reports filed Jan. 31 give the first indication of who gave Trump and the Republican National Committee the $287 million they raked in after election day, even as his claims of widespread voter fraud were rejected in dozens of court cases. Just $13 million went toward legal expenses, ABC News reported. …

Observers say Trump’s fundraising in Texas mirrors a national trend during that period as the president and the Republican Party made repeated appeals to supporters for help Trump’s “Election Defense Fund.”

Much of the money raised actually went toward more fundraising efforts and over $30 million was transferred into a new committee that Trump set up after the election, Save America.

“Big time bait-and-switch by Donald Trump and a bunch of other politicians lower in the food chain capitalizing on that opportunity — to rip their own supporters off, really,” said Paul S. Ryan, vice president of policy and litigation at Common Cause, a government watchdog group in Washington, D.C.

“The donors who were defrauded by and large in November and December by team Trump — these were elderly Republican donors who …it’s just despicable to prey on that donor pool, in my opinion,” Ryan said.