State Republican Parties Are Going Broke Due To Trump's Legal Bills

Republican parties in several states are going broke because the RNC is being drained by Trump's legal bills.

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State Republican Parties Are In Big Trouble

State and local political parties are, in many ways, the backbone of democracy. Most people won’t meet a president. Maybe they won’t meet a senator, and House members represent hundreds of thousands of people, but local and state parties are the direct connections to voters. Local and state parties draft candidates for local and state races, do tons of voter outreach, and they also are the “boots on the ground” for political campaigns.

An unhealthy state party is one of the big indicators of how a party will fare in November, which makes what is happening in state Republican parties across the country a huge red flag for the GOP.

NBC News reported:

A growing number of state Republican operations are either broke or perilously close to it. Last year, the Minnesota Republican Party reported having only $53 in the bank and over $330,000 in debt. In January, Michigan’s Republicans faced bankruptcy amid a brutal MAGA leadership fight. So much for being the party of fiscal responsibility.

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Republicans can thank Donald Trump for their current financial problems. Trump’s deal with the RNC requires the party to run its donations first through his Save America PAC — which already paid over $50 million toward Trump’s personal legal fees in 2023 alone. That was before RNC co-chair Lara Trump mused about skipping the middleman making the GOP pay Trump’s legal bills directly.

There is another layer to the state GOP woes. As soon as Donald Trump got into power, he relentlessly asked Republican small donors for money. Trump was warned that he was burning out the small donor base, but he kept pressing on and on. Finally, those small donors were tired and tapped out. They stopped giving to all Republicans. Trump didn’t care because he got his big pile of money, but some swing state Republican parties hit the skids.