Red Curve Solutions offers a variety of services to political campaigns, as stated on the company’s LinkedIn page. These services include comprehensive budgeting, accounting, financial management, and compliance services.
According to a release by the Campaign Legal Center on Wednesday, the payments made by Trump’s campaign and committees are mostly categorized as “Reimbursement for Legal Fees” or “Reimbursement for Legal Expenses.” This is a common practice where campaigns often hire external organizations to handle tasks such as polling, consulting, and other needs.
“The organization claims that the arrangement appears to be intentionally crafted to conceal the actual beneficiaries of a significant portion of Trump’s legal expenses, potentially violating federal law,” the organization stated.
According to a press release by CLC, it seems that Red Curve has been covering Donald Trump’s legal expenses since December 2022. The release states that Trump-affiliated committees later reimbursed the company. However, this arrangement appears to violate FEC rules, which mandate the disclosure of both the reimbursing entity (in this case, Red Curve) and the vendor involved.
According to the Campaign Legal Center (CLC), this arrangement would prevent the public from knowing the details of Trump’s legal work, including which law firms are being paid and how much. CLC further argues that this arrangement may also violate a federal prohibition on corporate political contributions. Being a limited liability corporation, Red Curve would be legally prohibited from making any contributions, including in-kind contributions or advances, to Trump’s campaign or any other “hard money” committee, even if the payment or advance is fully reimbursed.
The Trump campaign has not yet responded to a request for comment.
The complaint also includes the Trump Save America Joint Fundraising Committee, the Save America leadership committee, Trump Make America Great Again Committee, and Make America Great Again PAC.
Experts in campaign finance have raised concerns regarding the utilization of campaign funds by Trump to cover his substantial legal expenses. An analysis by USA TODAY reveals that Save America has allocated $76 million towards legal fees.
During a period when he is facing significant legal scrutiny and requires funds to address substantial judgments in civil lawsuits and multiple criminal cases, Trump’s campaign has been directing money towards his businesses.
According to the recent FEC report, Trump’s joint fundraising committee made several payments to his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. In February, three checks were written, amounting to a total of $411,287. Additionally, another payment of $62,337 was made to Trump National Doral Miami in March.
Trump has provided a $91.6 million bond in the defamation case filed against him by writer E. Jean Carroll. Additionally, he has posted a $175 million bond in a separate fraud case related to falsifying business records.
Donald Trump is presently facing a criminal trial in New York City for allegations of making hush money payments to conceal an affair with an adult film star.
The Federal Election Commission (FEC) possesses a wide array of powers, primarily focused on the imposition of fines. Nonetheless, the prevalence of deadlocked party-line votes often results in certain ambiguous aspects of the law going unenforced.