Remarkably, he makes a point.
Last year, in the waning days of the Senate Democratic majority, Democrats in Congress agreed with Republicans to include a weakening of campaign finance limits to the party national committees in a spending bill. The
result:
According to filings last week, the Republican National Committee has raised nearly 10 times as much as its Democratic counterpart from donors who took advantage of the new loophole.
Following the 2010 Citizens United Supreme Court decision that ushered in an era of unlimited donations to outside groups backing political campaigns, the super-PACs supporting presidential candidates have brought in eye-popping hauls. Jeb Bush's super-PAC has raised more than $100 million, and a single donor cut a $10 million check to a Ted Cruz super-PAC. Party committees, which have seen their influence diminished as outside money flows freely, have tried to get creative in boosting their fundraising totals. The RNC, which will spend heavily on both the presidential race and congressional battles next year, has been much more successful: It's raised $63 million this year, including $7.7 million in the month of July. The DNC has raised just $36.4 million, and $4.9 million in July. […]
A substantial portion of the Republican advantage comes from the new loophole. Previously, donors could contribute a maximum of $32,400 per year to the party. Now they can give not only $33,400 to the main fundraising accounts of the RNC and DNC (the same amount as last year, adjusted for inflation), but an additional $100,200 to three auxiliary fundraising accounts. That means an individual donor can now give a total of $334,600 a year to either party.
There are a lot more people capable of spending $334,600 on a political party whose ideology aligns with Republicans than the Democrats. Not that we didn't already know that, but it never hurts to keep on recognizing it. In fact, several of the people donating the new maximum to the RNC have also donated big to individual candidates. This Mother Jones story points out that the largest donors to the RNC are Hushang Ansary and his wife, who have given the maximum $668,000. Ansary, who was "part of the Shah of Iran's inner circle and served as the Shah's ambassador to the United States before the Iranian Revolution," has also given $2 million to Jeb! Bush's Right to Rise PAC.
But here's the thing—that's not necessarily all that good for them. For one thing, it means the clown car can run with a lot of clowns for a lot longer. If a whole mess of Republican candidates have their own personal millionaires helping them, they can stay in this longer. But there's also the inconvenient problem of their front-runner, who is quite blunt in talking about how he used his money to influence politicians and how that's a problem.
“I will tell you that our system is broken,” the celebrity real estate mogul said. “I gave to many people, before this, before two months ago, I was a businessman. I give to everybody. When they call, I give. And do you know what? When I need something from them two years later, three years later, I call them, they are there for me.”
Yeah, that's broken. So maybe Trump is actually doing us a favor, after all.