Former President Donald Trump’s political operation has routed more than $3 million so far this year through a Delaware limited liability company whose owners are not publicly disclosed, according to campaign finance records — a strategy that mirrors past efforts to mask exactly how his campaign is spending donor cash.
The money has been paid to Launchpad Strategies LLC, a company that appears to have been incorporated in Delaware in November, according to state business records and lists a Raleigh, North Carolina, post office box as its address in campaign finance filings. Since it was formally incorporated, the company has received $3.1 million in payments from the Trump campaign and an affiliated joint fundraising committee.
The payments add up to make the company the second-largest vendor used this year by the Trump Save America Joint Fundraising Committee, which is a financial hub for Trump fundraising efforts, with contributions then divided between it and other committees based on a formula. In this case, the contributions are shared with the formal campaign and Save America, a committee that has helped pay millions of dollars in Trump legal bills.
The joint fundraising committee has spent nearly $2.8 million with Launchpad Strategies, according to campaign finance records current through April.
Little is known about Launchpad Strategies LLC beyond its existence and the millions of dollars it has taken in from a presidential campaign.
It has never done other political work for state-level or federal candidates, according to federal and state campaign finance disclosure filings. The first payment from the Trump operation was on Dec. 18, just over a month after the company appears to have been incorporated in Delaware.
The company’s website offers no information about services it offers or who runs it. A contact page that offers people a place to reach out and ask questions appears inactive, and multiple requests for comment NBC News tried to send through the site went unanswered.
While the company uses the Raleigh post office box as an address in federal campaign finance reports, state officials in North Carolina confirmed to NBC News last week that no company by that name is registered in the state.
“We don’t have a business entity by that name in our Business Registration database,” said Liz Proctor, a spokeswoman for the North Carolina secretary of state.
The Trump campaign would not discuss specifics other than to say it is focused on fundraising outreach.
“This is a digital advertising company that is primarily focused on our fundraising,” said Brian Hughes, a Trump campaign spokesman. “As you note, the FEC documents include their listing in compliance with our reporting obligations.”
Campaign finance watchdog organizations said the quasi-anonymous relationship between the company and the campaign raises red flags and reminds them of previous attempts by Trump’s campaign to mask how donor cash was being spent.
“It’s concerning to see a company formed just six months ago suddenly receive over $3.1 million from Donald Trump’s network of political committees, particularly since there is virtually no public information about this company,” said Saurav Ghosh, the Campaign Legal Center’s director of federal campaign finance reform. “Who works there, what services they offer or have provided and whether Trump’s payments to ‘Launchpad Strategies LLC’ are for bona fide services or are, instead, actually payments to other vendors funneled through a mere corporate shell.”
The Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission after the 2020 election cycle alleging that Trump’s campaign ran more than $500 million through a firm called American Made Media Consultants, which it argued appeared to be a shell company designed to obscure exactly whom the campaign was paying.
The FEC deadlocked, and the complaint was dismissed.
In April, the Campaign Legal Center also filed an FEC complaint alleging a network of Trump-aligned organizations was working with a Republican compliance firm called Red Curve Solutions to “obscure the true recipients of a noteworthy potion of Trump’s legal bills.”
The Campaign Legal Center says pushing for campaign spending transparency is an important part of the federal campaign process.
“Transparency about how political campaigns are spending their donors’ money is vital to the integrity of our elections,” Ghosh said. “Voters have a right to know how candidates are spending their money when deciding whom to support in November.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
