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Donald Trump. | Photo courtesy of Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images/Stacker
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Former President Donald Trump has one eye on the campaign trail as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee from his perch in a Manhattan courthouse as his hush-money trial unfolds.
The latest polling shows a close race so far, with Trump eking out a slight advantage over President Joe Biden. But one area where the Biden campaign has the advantage is the amount of cash on hand: Since January 2023, Biden has raised $158.5 million to Trump’s $95.6 million, according to Federal Election Commission data.
Though he failed to get support from traditional Republican mega-donors, many of whom supported former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in the primaries, Trump’s support largely comes from supporters donating smaller — yet more frequent — amounts. He’s also done well in industries that benefited from his presidential policies, including the financial sector.
Stacker examined data compiled and analyzed by OpenSecrets to see which companies are donating the most money to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign or any PACs working on his behalf so far during the 2024 election cycle.
Campaign finance laws prohibit companies from donating directly to campaigns, so totals represent donations from the business’s political action committees, owners, employees and their families. Companies are ranked by the share of donations made during the 2024 election cycle that went to Trump. When that information was not available, the total dollar amounts were used. The data is accurate as of March 2024.
Marquee names include New York Jets owner Woody Johnson and financial services company Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick. The biggest company donor to Trump’s campaign is McMahon Ventures, a consulting firm owned by former WWE CEO Vince McMahon and his wife Linda, who held a cabinet position in the Trump administration.
The list also includes some surprises, including a Wisconsin steel and transportation conglomerate and a film-packaging company out of Ohio. Read on to see which other companies and their employees are backing Trump this election cycle.
22. Excel Communications
Donated to Trump: $250,000 (Total donations not available)
Excel Communications was founded in 1988 by Texas entrepreneur Kenny Troutt and long-distance reseller Steve Smith. Troutt took the company public in 1996. At one point, Excel Communications was the fifth-largest long-distance carrier. Teleglobe bought Excel in 1998 for $3.5 billion, making Troutt a billionaire. He stepped down as CEO in 1999.
Today, Troutt owns a 2,400-acre thoroughbred horse farm in Kentucky, where he keeps several prize-winning horses. Troutt has also become a major Republican donor: He and his spouse contributed $1.7 million to Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign, among other major donations to campaigns for Rick Santorum, Rick Perry and a super PAC backing Mitch McConnell.
21. Churchill Business Consultants
Donated to Trump: $500,000 (Total donations not available)
Churchill Business Consultants is run by Adam Kidan, who pleaded guilty in 2005 to fraud and conspiracy along with his former business partner Jack Abramoff for faking a $23 million wire transfer. The company listing was updated in late 2023 to an address in Ontario, New York, with Kidan listed as an agent.
Kidan — a former resident of Manheim Township in the battleground state of Pennsylvania — in April co-hosted a Bucks County fundraiser for Trump. Campaign finance records show Kidan has contributed around $1.5 million since 2016 to Republicans and GOP political committees.
20. Westminster Management
Donated to Trump: $1 million (Total donations not available)
Westminster Management is a property management company overseeing more than 20,000 apartment homes in 13 states. The company also goes by JK2, after the names of its 50/50 co-owners, Joshua Kushner and his brother Jared, who is Trump’s son-in-law. The firm agreed in 2022 to pay a $3.25 million settlement for a 2019 lawsuit alleging a failure to maintain properties and charging tenants illegal fees.
In March 2024, a Maryland court ruled against the company in another lawsuit alleging Westminster charged tenants inflated and illegal late fees.
Jared Kushner served as a senior adviser in Trump’s former administration.
19. New York Jets/Johnson Co.
Donated to Trump: $1 million (Total donations not available)
The New York Jets football team has been co-owned by brothers Robert “Woody” and Christopher Johnson since 2000. Woody Johnson is a reliable Republican donor. Former President Donald Trump appointed Johnson as United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom during his term.
18. America First Action
Donated to Trump: $1,003,600 (Total donations not available)
America First is a Trump super PAC, an independent political action committee without fundraising limits from corporations, individuals and unions. Super PACs may not contribute or coordinate directly with candidates or parties.
America First’s top affiliates are America First Action and America First Policies. The Super PAC spent more than $133 million on the 2020 federal election, 96% of which was spent during the general election.
17. G.H. Palmer Associates
Donated to Trump: $2,006,600 (Total donations not available)
G.H. Palmer Associates is a diversified real estate company founded in 1978. The company’s website asserts that G.H. Palmer’s portfolio of more than 15,000 apartment units in Southern California is valued in excess of $6 billion. The business’ billionaire owner, Geoffrey Harrison Palmer, is a third-generation California builder and attorney, as well as a longstanding Republican donor.
Palmer has repeatedly landed in the crosshairs of scandals, including charges against him for laundering campaign contributions. In 2022, he agreed to pay $12.5 million to 19,000 former tenants in a case alleging widespread security deposit fraud.
16. Fox, Paine & Co.
Donated to Trump: $491,700 (19.1% of all donations)
Fox, Paine & Co. is a private equity firm founded in 1996 and headquartered in Miami Beach, Florida. Its CEO, Saul Fox, made international news in 2023 when stories broke that a set of ancient oil lamps Fox gave to Trump in 2019, ostensibly on loan from the Israel Antiquities Authority, ended up at Mar-a-Lago. Fox had requested the lamps from the IAA to present to Trump at the White House Hanukkah party that year as a thank-you for Trump’s Israel policies.
Fox is also the donor behind ghost corporation Children of Israel, which donated $884,000 in GOP contributions in 2016.
15. Cantor Fitzgerald
Donated to Trump: $1 million (35.1% of all donations)
Cantor Fitzgerald is a New York City financial brokerage and real estate investment firm with a global footprint. It was founded in 1945.
In April, Cantor Fitzgerald’s CEO Howard Lutnick hosted a fundraiser for Trump alongside a bevy of marquee donors, including hedge fund billionaire John Paulson, who was rumored to be a possible pick for Trump’s Treasury chief. The firm also made headlines in the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election when Lutnick held a fundraiser at his swanky penthouse that raised upward of $5 million for then-candidate Trump.
Cantor Fitzgerald has come under the scrutiny of corporate watchdogs in recent years. In 2023, the Securities and Exchange Commission fined Cantor Fitzgerald for repeatedly failing to identify customers considered large traders, typically professional or institutional investors. It has also been in the crosshairs of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, facing steep fines for lack of transparency and failure to disclose key information, among other violations.
Given two new monetary policies, including the Federal Trade Commission’s move to end noncompete clauses, Cantor Fitzgerald may be putting its money on the more “business friendly” candidate — and Lutnick didn’t mince words about these intentions. “The Republican Party is a less regulatory party,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg News.
14. Woodforest Financial Group
Donated to Trump: $250,000 (37.1% of all donations)
Woodforest Financial Group is a privately held bank based in Texas with longstanding ties to the Republican Party. The company has made numerous donations in 2024 via its subsidiaries to far right-wing candidates, including Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Florida, and Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colorado, according to OpenSecrets.
A report by the Brookings Institution found that Woodforest National Bank — a wholly owned subsidiary of Woodforest Financial Group — made more than 100% of its profit in 2019 and 2020 from overdraft fees.
13. Mt. Vernon Investments
Donated to Trump: $268,480 (41.2% of all donations)
Mt. Vernon Investments is a Dallas-based investment firm. The name may sound familiar: Company CEO Kenny Troutt is the telecom billionaire who made it big as co-founder of Excel Communications, another major Trump donor. The firm has contributed to a variety of Republican committees and candidates, including $556,800 to the Republican National Committee.
12. Advance Financial
Donated to Trump: $1 million (54.4% of all donations)
Advance Financial, a Nashville-based payday lender, is run by Mike Hodges, a self-defined “enthusiastic” Trump supporter and a top donor in previous elections. A 2020 Mother Jones investigation revealed that Hodges openly bragged about how his donations to the Trump campaign gave leverage to payday lenders, an industry with a long history of pushing financial products that prey on the financial precarity of the working poor.
The investigation referenced a 2019 webinar recording obtained by The Washington Post, where Hodges spoke explicitly about raising money for Trump to weaken regulations for payday lenders. Industry consumer advocates expressed concern that predatory practices would grow under the Trump administration.
11. DSB Technologies
Donated to Trump: $250,000 (66.7% of all donations)
DSB Technologies, a supplier and manufacturer of stainless steel metal parts, was founded in 1980 under the name SSI Technologies. The company, based in Janesville, Wisconsin, spent $55,000 in 2023 on lobbying efforts.
10. Ascent Residential
Donated to Trump: $256,600 (68.1% of all donations)
Alabama-based real estate investment firm Ascent Residential, also known as B&M Management, is a major GOP donor. Between 2015 and 2018, CEO John Blanchard and wife Lynda donated $2 million to Republicans. A 2021 ProPublica investigation about Trump mega-donors found that Lynda Blanchard — who Trump appointed ambassador to Slovenia, the birthplace of former first lady Melania Trump — was particularly candid about her desire for an appointment.
Lynda later ran to represent Alabama in the U.S. Senate for the 2022 election but switched her campaign focus to run for the governor’s office instead. Despite a Mar-a-Lago fundraiser and a visit from Trump himself, the former president endorsed her rival in the Senate race.
9. Key Square Group
Donated to Trump: $506,600 (76.3% of all donations)
Hedge fund manager Key Square Group is a Connecticut-based firm led and founded by Scott Bessent, the former chief investment officer of Soros Fund Management. Bessent attended the Palm Beach fundraiser in early April along with other Trump mega-donors that raised over $40 million for the presumed Republican nominee.
In a January letter to Key Square shareholders, Bessent wrote that a “Trump rally” was triggered by the former president’s lead in the polls. He went on to explain his reasoning, as voters anticipate “an extended, market-friendly economic, tax, and regulatory environment,” comparing Trump’s “redemption” to the “roaring ’20s” deregulatory environment.
In 2019, Bessent was also among the largest donors to Stand For America Inc., a nonprofit policy advocacy group belonging to the former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. It was widely believed that Haley was setting the stage for her now-defunct 2024 presidential campaign.
8. Next Generation Films
Donated to Trump: $999,000 (79.1% of all donations)
Film-packaging company Next Generation Films, based out of Ohio, was founded in 1994 by David Frecka. Charter NEX Films acquired Next Generation Films in 2019 for $1.07 billion. Frecka and his wife Brenda, are major Republican donors; the two were among the top 20 super PAC donors in 2021.
7. Pate Holdings
Donated to Trump: $356,600 (88.1% of all donations)
Pate Holdings is a privately owned real estate development and investment company headquartered in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. It is primarily focused in the Southeast.
6. GeoSouthern Energy
Donated to Trump: $1 million (88.8% of all donations)
GeoSouthern Energy is an oil and gas production and exploration company based in The Woodlands, Texas. The company’s billionaire founder is George Bishop, who along with his wife, donated $100 million in 2023 to Mississippi State University in support of the George Bishop Family Endowed Scholarship. Bishop also contributed $1 million to Trump super PAC MAGA Inc. in 2023; the PAC raised more than $46 million in the second half of that year.
5. Witkoff Group
Donated to Trump: $253,300 (89.5% of all donations)
Headquartered in New York City, Witkoff Group is a real estate development and investment firm founded by Steven Witkoff in 1997. Witkoff personally donated nearly $275,000 in 2023 across political action committees and Trump’s individual presidential campaign, according to federal campaign finance records. In April, he organized a meeting between Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to come together in support of Trump’s presidential bid.
4. CrownQuest Operating
Donated to Trump: $5 million (90.1% of all donations)
CrownQuest Operating is an oil and gas company based out of Midland, Texas. In December, Occidental Petroleum announced finalized plans to acquire CrownRock for $10.8 billion, a company that owns the oil reserves and wells CrownQuest drills in.
Tim Dunn is the CEO of CrownQuest and CrownRock. Three of his sons also work at CrownQuest. Dunn is also a major right-wing donor, political activist, and Christian nationalist. In March, 11 of the 28 House candidates Tim Dunn supported won their primaries.
3. M&M Industries
Donated to Trump: $458,949 (90.3% of all donations)
M&M Industries is a molding plastics manufacturer that specializes in packaging and pails for the chemical, food, and pharmaceutical industries.
The largest percentage of 2024 donations from the company’s members, employees, and owners — along with those individual’s immediate family members — have gone to the Republican super PAC MAGA Inc.
2. Hendricks Holding Co.
Donated to Trump: $5,000,225 (93.5% of all donations)
Hendricks Holding is a conglomerate of businesses across construction, the film industry, insurance, real estate, restaurants and transportation and logistics. The corporation was founded in 2001 by conservative billionaire Diane Hendricks and her late husband Ken Hendricks. Diane Hendricks served as an economic advisor to Trump’s 2016 campaign.
1. McMahon Ventures
Donated to Trump: $5,250,000 (97.5% of all donations)
McMahon Ventures is a consulting firm owned by husband-and-wife duo Linda and Vince McMahon, who also founded World Wrestling Entertainment. Linda McMahon also served in Trump’s cabinet as administrator of the Small Business Administration.
Written by Nicole Caldwell and Alizah Salario. Data reporting and additional writing by Elena Cox. Copy editing by Tim Bruns. Photo selection by Lacy Kerrick. This story was copy edited from its original version.
Re-published with CC BY-NC 4.0 License.
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