Donald Trump is defined in large part by his dishonesty, but the lies that appear in the former president’s fundraising appeals are often hysterical, even by his standards. The Washington Post this week highlighted the Republican’s willingness to use “false [and] inflammatory messages to rake in campaign cash,” adding, “Some recent pitches have raised eyebrows even among longtime Trump observers and advisers.”
It was against this backdrop that The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported:
Donald Trump has amped up false claims about his criminal case in Fulton County ahead of this week’s presidential debate in Atlanta. One that’s caught steam in recent days is a statement the former president made in a campaign fundraising appeal that “they tortured me in the Fulton County jail.”
The fundraising message, which included an offer for a $47 mug, told prospective donors, “I want you to remember what they did to me. They tortured me in the Fulton County Jail and TOOK MY MUG SHOT.”
The fact that the former president was photographed as part of the legal process wasn’t especially controversial — Trump, a private citizen, was treated like every other criminal suspect arraigned in Fulton County — so there was no obvious need to put the mugshot reference in all caps.
The local report nevertheless went on to note, “There’s no evidence that Trump was tortured or mistreated when he surrendered at the Fulton jail after being indicted on 13 felony counts last August. But it’s just the latest of many lies, exaggerations and half-truths the former president has made over the years about the Fulton case, District Attorney Fani Willis and other prosecutors who have scrutinized him in recent years.”
It’s also a timely reminder that the presumptive GOP nominee insists on always being seen as a victim, especially in those rare instances in which he’s facing possible accountability for his alleged wrongdoing.
But stepping back, it’s also worth emphasizing the fundraising controversies that have become a staple of his political operation. Ahead of Election Day 2020, for example, the Republican and his team set up a default system for online donors: By adding easily overlooked pre-checked boxes and opaque fine print, the then-president’s operation was able to fleece unsuspecting donors for months.
As The New York Times later reported, banks and credit card companies were soon inundated “with fraud complaints from the president’s own supporters about donations they had not intended to make, sometimes for thousands of dollars.” Some donors even “canceled their cards” just to make the recurring payments to Trump stop.
After Election Day 2020, the Republican and his team pleaded with donors to contribute to his “Official Election Defense Fund,” which didn’t actually exist.
Now, still hoping to separate his followers from their money, Trump and his team are making up “torture” claims and sending fundraising appeals falsely claiming that President Joe Biden authorized the FBI to kill him at Mar-a-Lago.
If the former president respected his supporters more, this simply wouldn’t happen. But Trump too often sees members of his base as easily fooled marks.
