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Trump Has Reeled in More Than $200 Million Since Election Day

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Trump Has Reeled in More Than 0 Million Since Election Day

Since his victory in November, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s allies have raised well over $200 million for a constellation of groups that will fund his inauguration, his political operation and eventually his presidential library, according to four people involved in the fund-raising.

It is a staggering sum that underscores efforts by donors and corporate interests to curry favor with Mr. Trump ahead of a second presidential term after a number of business leaders denounced him following the violence by his supporters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Mr. Trump has promised to gut the “deep state” and made various promises to industry supporters. Among the pledged donors for the inaugural events are Pfizer, OpenAI, Amazon and Meta, along with cryptocurrency firms.

The total haul for the committee financing his inaugural festivities — at least $150 million raised, with more expected — will eclipse the record-setting $107 million raised for his 2017 inauguration, according to three people briefed on the matter who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to share internal financial information.

Other committees benefiting from the fund-raising blitz include a super PAC called Make America Great Again Inc. and its associated nonprofit group, which is expected to be used by Mr. Trump’s team to back his agenda and candidates who support it, while opposing dissenters.

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Mr. Trump has boasted about the haul, telling people during the Christmas holiday season that he had raised more than $200 million since the election. Mr. Trump’s team has repeatedly noted how many people have wanted to find ways to donate to him since his election win.

The Trump transition and inaugural committee did not return emails seeking comment about the fund-raising haul.

David Tamasi, a lobbyist who has raised money for Mr. Trump, dismissed a suggestion that corporate interests were giving to avoid Mr. Trump’s wrath, though he acknowledged that some donors may be trying to atone for having previously maintained distance from the president-elect.

“It is a time-honored D.C. tradition that corporations are enthusiastically embracing this cycle in all manners, largely because they were on the sidelines during previous Trump cycles,” he said. “They no longer have to hedge their political bets.”

Inaugural committees can accept unlimited contributions from individuals and corporations, but not foreign nationals. Major corporations that try to avoid partisan politics have long donated to inaugural funds to signal a willingness to work with new administrations and support for the democratic transfer of power, regardless of the incoming president’s party.

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But there is cross-pollination among top fund-raisers for Mr. Trump’s inauguration and his political efforts, including several partners at lobbying firms that represent major corporate interests. Raising money for the inauguration can help lobbyists secure access for clients, and cachet for themselves with the incoming administration.

Among the four finance chairs for Mr. Trump’s inaugural committee are the lobbyist Jeff Miller and Reince Priebus, a former chief of staff in the Trump White House who is not a lobbyist but is chairman of the board of advisers of the lobbying firm Michael Best Strategies. Their firms represent companies with much at stake in the forthcoming administration, some of which plan to donate to the inauguration.

Mr. Miller’s firm, Miller Strategies, represents Pfizer and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, each of which has pledged donations. Their executives met after the election at Mar-a-Lago with Mr. Trump and his choice for health and human services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., amid concerns about how the drug industry might be affected by Mr. Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic.

Since the election, Mr. Miller’s firm has registered to lobby for the ride-share tech company Uber, which has donated $1 million, as has, separately, its chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi. The firm also represents the tech company OpenAI, whose chief executive, Sam Altman, plans to give $1 million. Michael Best Strategies has represented the cryptocurrency firm Ripple for nearly four years. It has pledged $5 million in its own cryptocurrency, XRP — among the largest known donations to the inaugural committee.

After the election, Ripple retained the lobbyist Brian Ballard, a top Trump fund-raiser.

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Another Ballard client, Robinhood, a leading cryptocurrency trading platform, has donated $2 million.

“We look forward to working with President Trump and the incoming administration to drive positive change in the markets, be an active voice for customers and pursue our mission to democratize finance for all,” Mary Elizabeth Taylor, Robinhood’s vice president of global government and external affairs, said in a statement.

Other companies associated with cryptocurrency are expected to be major contributors as well, reflecting optimism that Mr. Trump will deliver on his campaign trail promises to dial back federal scrutiny that figures in the industry say have stifled its growth.

Amazon, a Ballard client that found itself crosswise with the first Trump administration, said it planned to donate $1 million in cash.

Donations of at least $1 million grant access to the top package of perks related to several days of festivities in the run-up to the inauguration on Jan. 20, including what are touted as “intimate” dinners with Mr. Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance, though often with many attendees, as well as black-tie balls after the swearing-in.

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Other entities, ranging from companies like Meta to previous Trump critics like the billionaire Ken Griffin, have made $1 million donations to the inaugural.

Contributions to inaugural committees, which are required to be publicly disclosed to the Federal Election Commission months after the inauguration, are one of the last major opportunities to financially support a second-term president.

Mr. Tamasi and Oswaldo Palomo, who are partners in the lobbying firm Chartwell Strategy Group, raised more than $3 million for the inaugural. Their firm represents companies that could be affected by Mr. Trump’s proposed tariffs, including the South Korean automaker Hyundai and a U.S. subsidiary of the South Korean conglomerate SK Group.

The deadline for donating to the inaugural to be eligible for the perks of the weekend is Jan. 10, according to documents distributed to potential donors.

If the inaugural committee’s fund-raising exceeds the amount budgeted for the festivities, the expectation among fund-raisers is that the excess would be transferred to the committee collecting money toward a presidential library for Mr. Trump after he leaves office, according to two people involved in the effort.

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The Donald J. Trump Presidential Library Fund Inc. was incorporated in Florida on Dec. 20, six days after it was revealed that ABC News had agreed to donate $15 million to Mr. Trump’s future presidential foundation and museum to settle a defamation claim he had brought against the network.

The fund was incorporated by a lawyer in Florida, Jacob Roth, who has previously created Trump groups, including the inaugural committee, according to state corporate records. The purpose of the entity, according to the Florida articles of incorporation, is “to preserve and steward the legacy of President Donald J. Trump and his presidency.”

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Trump’s doctor recommends he lose weight and exercise more but says he is in ‘excellent health’ | CNN Politics

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Trump’s doctor recommends he lose weight and exercise more but says he is in ‘excellent health’ | CNN Politics

The White House released the results of President Donald Trump’s May physical late Friday evening, sharing a memo from his physician recommending he lose weight and exercise more while noting he is in excellent health.

“President Trump remains in excellent health, demonstrating strong cardiac, pulmonary, neurological, and overall physical function,” White House physician Dr. Sean Barbabella wrote in a letter. “Cognitive and physical performance are excellent. He is fully fit to carry out all duties of the Commander-in-Chief and Head of State.”

Barbabella wrote, “Preventive counseling was provided,” during the exam, “including guidance on diet, recommendation to take a low-dose aspirin, increased physical activity, and continued weight loss.”

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The doctor noted the president stands 6 feet 3 inches tall and weighs 238 pounds.

At his physical exam last April, Trump weighed 224 pounds.

His visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center Tuesday marked the third time he’s visited the facility for a medical exam since becoming the oldest president ever inaugurated last year.

Prior to the visit, the White House said the check-up would include “routine annual dental and medical assessments,” despite him having already visited a dentist in Florida twice this year.

Immediately following the visit, Trump offered scant details on Truth Social, writing “Everything checked out PERFECTLY.”

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Since returning to the White House in 2025, visible ailments and speculation over his health have prompted the White House to divulge new details of the president’s physical condition.

The White House said swelling in his legs and ankles that was revealed last summer​ was a result of chronic venous insufficiency, a condition in which valves inside certain veins don’t work the way they should, which can allow blood to pool or collect in the veins. Trump attempted wearing compression socks, but found them uncomfortable.

In Friday’s letter, the president’s doctor wrote that, during Tuesday’s physical, “Slight lower leg swelling was noted, with improvement from last year.”

The president has also developed noticeable bruising on his hands during his second term, which the White House has chalked up to frequent handshakes and attempted to cover up with concealer in photographs.

According to the doctor’s readout, Trump also submitted to a “comprehensive neurological exam,” which showed “normal mental status, intact cranial nerves, normal motor strength, sensation, reflexes, gait, and balance.”

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As for Trump’s heart health, the doctor said, “Al-enhanced electrocardiogram (ECG) analysis estimated his cardiac age…to be approximately 14 years younger than his chronological age.”

Barbabella’s letter noted that Trump currently takes aspirin but didn’t give a dosage. When it’s used for preventive purposes, doctors generally advise taking 81 milligrams of aspirin per day, but Trump told the Wall Street Journal in January that he takes 325 milligrams, a dose that can raise the risk of bleeding.

“They say aspirin is good for thinning out the blood, and I don’t want thick blood pouring through my heart,” Trump told the WSJ. “I want nice, thin blood pouring through my heart. … They’d rather have me take the smaller one. I take the larger one, but I’ve done it for years, and what it does do is, it causes bruising.”

Trump again took the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, a 10-minute screening test used to detect mild cognitive impairment and early dementia. The doctor said the president scored 30 out of 30.

This story has been updated with additional details.

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Judge Tosses Citizenship Law Aimed at New Voters in New Hampshire

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Judge Tosses Citizenship Law Aimed at New Voters in New Hampshire

A federal judge has struck down a New Hampshire law that blocked new voters from using a sworn affidavit to prove their citizenship in the absence of official documents such as a birth certificate or passport.

The decision, filed late Thursday by Judge Samantha D. Elliott of the U.S. District Court in New Hampshire, found that “eliminating the affidavits” as a means of proving citizenship “constitutes an unjustifiable burden on the right to vote in violation of the First and 14th Amendments.” The ruling immediately overturned the law, which was passed in 2024 and signed by the Republican governor at the time, Chris Sununu.

A spokesman for New Hampshire’s Justice Department said the state intended to appeal the decision.

The law “represents a common-sense approach to voter registration and election administration designed to protect the integrity of our elections,” the spokesman, Michael Garrity, said in a statement on Friday.

The law, which created some of the strictest voter registration requirements in the country, was challenged by the American Civil Liberties Union of New Hampshire on behalf of several groups, including the League of Women Voters of New Hampshire.

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“New Hampshire’s elections have always been safe, secure and accurate,” Henry Klementowicz, the state A.C.L.U.’s deputy legal director, said in a statement. “This law could have unconstitutionally and needlessly prevented thousands of eligible voters from casting a ballot.”

Reports of wrongful voting in the state did not decline after the law’s passage, Judge Elliott noted, with a similar number of reports filed with the state attorney general in the year before the law was passed, and the year after.

The push for proof of citizenship has been at the core of Republican-backed efforts to change voting rules, ever since President Trump and his allies began promoting baseless conspiracy theories over the past decade that there has been widespread voter fraud by noncitizens.

Mr. Trump put documentary proof of citizenship at the center of his effort to change the country’s voting laws last year. He first signed an executive order in March 2025 that partly sought to establish such a requirement for federal elections, but that provision of the order was rejected by federal courts.

Republicans in Congress then took up the charge, making documentary proof of citizenship central to their federal voting legislation, known as the SAVE America Act. But the measure has stalled in Congress, where Republicans do not have enough votes to overcome a Democratic filibuster of the bill.

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With the bill in limbo, Mr. Trump has threatened not to sign any other legislation until Republicans reform the filibuster to pass it, a procedural move known as the “nuclear option.” But his threats have not moved many Republicans to make the move.

There is no evidence of widespread voting by noncitizens, and the Trump administration’s efforts to prove these conspiracies are not succeeding: Out of 49.5 million voter registrations that have been checked by the beginning of 2026, the Department of Homeland Security referred around 0.02 percent of the names for further investigation. Any actual proven cases are likely to be a fraction of that fraction.

Even before the new law was passed, New Hampshire’s voting access had been more limited than most states’. It did not offer early in-person voting, or registration by mail for most voters. And it removed inactive voters after four years. More than 195,000 voters were removed in 2021 alone, according to a summary of evidence in the 100-page court decision.

New Hampshire does offer same-day registration on Election Day, an option that was used by voters some 350,000 times from 2016 to 2024, witnesses testified.

Under the law that was struck down, voters who showed up to register could present a birth certificate, a passport, naturalization papers “or any other reasonable documentation.” But they could no longer, as an alternative, sign an affidavit stating they were 18, a resident of the municipality they were voting in and a citizen of the United States.

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“It may be tempting for some to describe the Qualified Voter Affidavit as an exception to the proof-of-citizenship requirement, but it is not,” Judge Elliott wrote in her decision. “A sworn affidavit capable of exposing an affiant to criminal prosecution is a method of proving citizenship.”

“Moreover,” she added, “the evidence shows that it is the only method of proof available to a significant number of New Hampshire voters.”

Experts testified in a trial this year that 5,000 to 30,000 residents in the state did not have documentary proof of citizenship. They said that 14,700 voters had used the affidavit option to register to vote from April to November of 2024.

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Which first lady feared her husband might be having a stroke? The quiz knows

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Which first lady feared her husband might be having a stroke? The quiz knows

From left: Jeff Bezos, Roland Garros, Jill Biden.

Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images; Branger/Getty Images/Hulton Archive; Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images


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Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images; Branger/Getty Images/Hulton Archive; Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

This week, the pope took a stand on artificial intelligence in an encyclical Google Gemini called “historic and highly ambitious” and an “aggressive, uncompromising critique.” Thanks, Gemini! Enjoy the quiz, y’all.

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