WASHINGTON | President Donald Trump said Monday that he will stop using taxpayer funds for television advertisements glorifying himself that sparked a major backlash, and instead tap his super PAC to cover costs going forward.
In a post on his social media site, Trump defended the ads, which cost at least $1.5 million in federal funds and have drawn intense criticism. Trump said they were “positive promotion for our Great U.S.A.”
“This is a rather standard thing to do,” the president wrote, while blaming intense criticism for using taxpayer funds on the ads on the “Radical Left.” But the president added that he’d “decided to do the Patriotic Ads, among others, and pay for them myself, and with money I raised for MAGA, Inc.”
That is Trump’s political war chest, which had amassed more than $400 million by the end of July. Trump has begun to tap it to boost Republican candidates around the country ahead of midterm elections.
Trump provided no details on reimbursing taxpayers for ads that already aired, nor how he would go about having his political organization pay for such future advertising.
The White House — which had fiercely defended using taxpayer money on spots meant to promote the president — said Monday night that MAGA Inc. will pay for such ads going forward. It did not answer questions on how it or Trump might prove that his political funds were being used on such future advertising.
Trump’s abrupt about-face came after leaders from both parties criticized using taxpayer funds for the ads.
Legal experts said the ads might even violate federal statutes, including a law against congressionally appropriated funds being used for “publicity or propaganda” and one limiting the partisan political activities of government employees.
The spots began airing in late September
The first ad featured clips of Trump talking about defeating communism interspersed with onscreen text promoting the “largest tax cuts in history,” “reigniting American manufacturing” and a call to “defend law and order and police.”
Later the same week, a second ad began running. It showed scenic videos of Mount Rushmore with quotes and clips from Trump’s Fourth of July weekend speech there honoring the country’s 250th anniversary.
A third, more recent one was virtually identical to an ad for Trump’s Republican reelection campaign in 2024 and showed him walking down a hallway as his voice can be heard warning of a “final battle” against “globalists” and “warmongers.”
All ended with a message: “Paid for by the U.S. Government.”
According to AdImpact, which tracks media spending, the spots had cost at least $1.4 million by the end of September. The actual amount spent could be far more, depending on whether networks classified the ad as a political ad.