The Daily Fuckup

On March 8, 2022, the House Jan. 6 committee was widening its investigation beyond the attack on the Capitol to include the money raised around Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. Committee investigators were looking at whether the Trump campaign, the RNC, affiliated super PACs and protest organizers used those claims to bring in donations and whether some of the pitches crossed into wire fraud or another legal violation. ([washingtonpost.com](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/08/jan-6-fundraising-trump/))

The committee’s inquiry was aimed at the fundraising machinery itself: who wrote the emails, who approved them, what the solicitations said, and where the money went. According to the reporting, investigators had questioned Trump campaign aides, campaign and RNC staff, and others involved in post-election fundraising as they tried to determine whether the people behind the pitches believed the fraud claims or treated them as a way to raise cash. ([washingtonpost.com](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/08/jan-6-fundraising-trump/))

The House committee said in a March 9 statement that it was investigating a violent attack on the Capitol and an effort to overturn the 2020 election, and that between Election Day 2020 and Jan. 6 the RNC and the Trump campaign solicited donations by pushing false claims of widespread fraud. The same statement said those emails encouraged supporters to pressure Congress to keep Trump in power. ([january6th-benniethompson.house.gov](https://january6th-benniethompson.house.gov/news/press-releases?page=4))

The reporting also described a joint fundraising structure that involved the Trump campaign, the RNC, Trump Make America Great Again Committee and Save America PAC. It said those groups raised more than $200 million after Trump’s defeat, while many of the appeals pushed an “Election Defense Fund” that was largely unspent and, in some cases, directed most small-dollar contributions to Save America rather than to a true election-defense effort. ([washingtonpost.com](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/08/jan-6-fundraising-trump/))

That did not amount to a finding that the fundraising was illegal. It meant the committee was treating the post-election appeals as part of the Jan. 6 record and asking whether donors were misled by claims the committee says were false. If investigators found potential crimes, they could refer them to the Justice Department, which would decide whether to act. ([washingtonpost.com](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/08/jan-6-fundraising-trump/))