Trump lands in hot water over pay-to-play allegations.
IRS penalty is not first accusation of bypassing rules
Donald Trump, who has repeatedly denounced payto-play politics during his campaign, is now defending himself against claims that he donated $25,000 to a group supporting the Florida attorney general, Pam Bondi, to sway her office’s review of fraud allegations at Trump University.
Trump’s payment of a $2,500 penalty to the Internal Revenue Service over that 2013 campaign gift amounted to only the latest slap of his wrist in a decadeslong record of shattering political donation limits and circumventing the rules governing contributions and lobbying.
In the 1980s, Trump was compelled to testify under oath before New York state officials after he directed tens of thousands of dollars to the president of the New York City Council through a myriad subsidiary companies to evade contribution limits. In the 1990s, the Federal Election Commission fined Trump for exceeding the annual limit on campaign contributions by $47,050, the largest violation in a single year. And in 2000, the New York state lobbying commission imposed a $250,000 fine for failing to disclose the full extent of his lobbying of state legislators.
For the most part, Trump has seemed unrepentant.
“I was under the impression that I was getting my money back,” he told the New York State Commission on Government Integrity in 1988.
In the Florida case, Trump is accused of using a large and timely political donation in 2013 to ward off an investigation by Bondi’s office: Days before the donation was made, The Orlando Sentinel reported that the New York state attorney general’s office had sued Trump University and noted that Bondi’s office was weighing whether to join in that litigation.
Trump and Bondi, who is supporting his campaign, have denied any connection.
But Democrats and liberal watchdogs seized the opportunity to accuse Trump of practicing the sort of corrupt politics he rails against on the campaign trail.
In recent years, Trump has made tens of thousands of dollars in contributions to at least four state attorneys general — Bondi of Florida and Greg Abbott of Texas, both Republicans, and Democrats Eric Schneiderman of New York and Kamala Harris of California — whose offices have looked into complaints about Trump University.
Abbott, whose office considered a lawsuit against Trump University before the company left Texas in 2010, now is supporting Trump — who donated $35,000 to Abbott’s successful 2014 gubernatorial campaign.