Former U.S. President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gestures as he attends a rally ahead of the New Hampshire primary election on January 22, 2024 in Laconia, New Hampshire, U.S.
New Mike | Reuters
Former US President Donald Trump has warned that he will blacklist donors to his Republican nominee Nikki Haley's campaign.
In an overnight post on a true social media site, Trump said that anyone who contributes to Haley's platform “is, from this moment on, permanently barred from the MAGA camp. We don't like them and we won't accept them.” The post did not specify whether he was also referring to donations made to a pro-Haley action group.
Acronym for Make America Great Again, MAGA is the slogan that reunited Trump's political base from his first presidential campaign and his 2017 to 2021 term in office.
He realized that it was common for campaign donors to redirect their resources toward the most successful party candidate. “When I ran for office and won, I noticed that the 'donors' of the losing candidate immediately came to me and wanted to 'help',” he said. “It's constant in politics, but not with me anymore.”
The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment on whether it represented official policy.
Former South Carolina Governor Haley X responded by urging supporters to contribute to her campaign on the social media site.
“So … donate here. Let's go!” she said.
Fundraising both supports a US candidate's campaign efforts and shows the breadth of their support base. US federal election campaign law sets strict rules and limits on contributions to a candidate's platform.
Trump won the New Hampshire Republican primary this week, prompting questions about whether the race to win the Republican nomination is now over. Haley says she has no plans to back down. CNBC has learned that billionaire Reed Hoffman is suspending funding to his campaign following the New Hampshire results.
Another high-profile candidate, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, dropped his candidacy Sunday and endorsed Trump. Dan Eberhardt, CEO of oil and drilling services company Canary and a former DeSantis supporter, told CNBC on Tuesday that he will visit Trump's private club in Mar-a-Lago, Florida on February 16 to raise funds against President Joe Biden. For the remainder of the election period. Biden has expressed interest in running for a second term.
Trump has been an outspoken and controversial figure during his first presidency, facing 91 felony counts in multiple civil and criminal investigations. His potential re-election was high on the agenda for business and political elites gathered at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last week — though not all attendees were convinced.
“In Davos, Donald Trump is already president,” Alex Soros, president of the Open Society Foundations, said at the end of the event. “That's a good thing, because the Davos consensus is always wrong.”
