One of the current attacks on special counsel Robert Mueller is that he hired people for the Russia investigation based on professional abilities, without checking their political donations. Now he's being raked over the coals for hiring someone who gave Hillary a donation. (Or three?)
So I thought I'd take a look at Trump's political donations. FEC has all the way back to 1979, when he donated to Carter/Mondale and to Sen. Al D’Amato (R-NY). I spent the evening putting it all in a spreadsheet and reviewing. Here's what I found:
Trump has donated to Hillary Clinton including presidential primaries (but not the general, not Bill Clinton, and not Obama either), Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid, Anthony Weiner, Joe Lieberman, Chris Dodd, Frank Lautenberg, Dick Durbin, Charlie Rangel, Dick Gephart, Rep. Ted Weiss (D-NY) Pat Moynihan, Ted Kennedy, Patrick Kennedy and a bunch of other Democrats including Al Gore for President in 1988.
Republicans, too, such as Giuliani (Exploratory Committee & campaign), Sen. Lowell Weicker (R-CT), Rep. Sue Kelly (R-NY), John Sweeney (R-NY) Pete Wilson (R-CA), McCain/Palin, Jack Kemp, Rep. Susan Molinari, Sen. John Heinz, Sen. Phil Gramm, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK), Sen. Bob Dole, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM) and lots more. Many, but not all, in districts he had some connection to such as Congressman Mark Foley, the Rep from Florida who got shunned over his creepy advances to young male Congressional pages. Trump gave several donations to Rep. Vito Fosella (R-Staten Island) who had to resign over, amongst other things, keeping a secret second family on the side.
Pretty much like Trump said: I give them all money. It helps me.
Looking in detail: The last donation to a Democrat was to Kirsten Gillibrand in Oct 2010. Senate run. In early 2011, he made 2 donations: to Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA) and to the NRSC. Those were his only two donations in the first four months of 2011.
On May 3, 2011, Osama bin Laden was killed in the famous raid. So it was the night before when Trump got mocked at the White House Correspondents Dinner. From that time forward, he never gave any more money to Democrats, according to the FEC.
Here's the rest of the 2011 donations:
- 5/3/11: Pete King (R-NY) for Congress
- 5/20/11: Allen West (R-FL) for Congress
- 12/9/11: Linda McMahon (R-CT) for Senate
- 12/19/11: Mitt Romney for President
2012 didn't have many donations, but somebody got his attention in 2013, when he gave donations to:
- Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)
- John Bolton's PAC
- Jon Cornyn (R-TX)
- Tim Cotton (R-AR)
- Steve Daines (R-MT)
- Louie Gohmert (R-TX)
- Trey Gowdy (R-SC)
- Raul Labrador (R-ID)
- Mitch McConnell (campaign & PAC)
- Tim Scott (R-SC)
- Jeff Sessions (R-AL)
- Allen West (R-FL)
- and more. (I didn’t look up all the names I wasn’t familiar with.)
In early 2015, The Donald concentrated more on early primary states, with donations to the State Republican Party organizations in New Hampshire, South Carolina & Iowa; Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Dean Heller (R-NV.) And a few others. (Once he announced, not another penny to anyone.)
I've long thought his run for President was at least in part to seek revenge on Obama for that mockery in 2011. Still looks that way to me.