(Reuters) – Former President Donald Trump’s 2024 White House campaign said on Wednesday he had raised $7 million since being indicted on federal charges last week, as his message of political persecution continues to resonate with die-hard supporters.
“President Trump Raises Over $6.6 Million and Counting Since Deranged Jack Smith Announced Political Prosecution,” Trump’s campaign wrote in an email to supporters on Wednesday, referring to the U.S. special counsel investigating him.
Over $4.5 million came from digital fundraising while $2.1 million was raised from a donor event on Tuesday at Trump’s Bedminster Club in New Jersey.
A spokesman for Trump, who is the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, later emailed Reuters stating that fundraising had passed the bar of $7 million since the indictment was announced on Thursday.
In the indictment, Trump was accused of illegally retaining classified government documents after leaving the White House and then conspiring to obstruct a federal probe of the matter.
He has sought to frame the charges as a Democratic-led attack to knock him out of the 2024 race – and one ultimately designed to hurt Republicans, 30% of whom are considered unwavering Trump supporters.
“They’re not coming after me, they’re coming after YOU,” Trump wrote in a fundraising email earlier on Wednesday, the day after he was arraigned and pleaded not guilty to all 37 counts in court.
Polling suggests Trump’s strategy is working: A vast majority of Republicans – some 81% – believe the charges are politically motivated, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Monday.
Trump also enjoyed a fundraising bump from charges in New York as part of a case involving hush money paid to a porn star. After word emerged in March that Trump was going to be charged, his campaign raised $7 million in three days, according to senior adviser Jason Miller.
Trump’s nearest rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, has a roughly $85 million political war chest, currently held in a state account.
(Reporting by Alexandra Ulmer; Editing by Mary Milliken and Cynthia Osterman)
