Former President Donald Trump asked oil industry executives last month to donate $1 billion to aid his campaign to retake the White House, three people familiar with the conversation told POLITICO — a request that campaign finance experts said appeared troubling but is probably legal.
The request, first reported Thursday by The Washington Post, occurred during a meeting of industry executives at the former president’s home in Palm Beach, Florida.
The oil industry has a long list of policy actions it would want Trump to take, including dismantling parts of President Joe Biden’s green agenda and rolling back pollution regulations that threaten to crimp their profits. As POLITICO reported Wednesday, oil executives are also preparing some highly specific requests for Trump, including executive orders they hope he would sign if reelected.
At the very least, the $1 billion ask points to problems with laws governing money in politics, said Erin Chlopak, senior campaign finance director at the watchdog group Campaign Legal Center.
