After stating "I'm not happy" about changes coming to the Republican National Committee with chair Ronna McDaniel's resignation announcement Monday, an RNC board member stated donors can't be asked to foot Donald Trump's legal bills — only to be reminded on-air that it had already happened.
During an interview with CNN's Dana Bash, Henry Barbour of Mississippi explained his misgivings about Trump stacking the leadership with MAGA loyalists like his daughter-in-law Lara Trump, and complained the RNC's mission is to support all GOP candidates — not just the embattled ex-president.
"I'm willing to take a stand that may not be popular with some right now," he told the CNN host. "The RNC has one job, Dana, and that's to win elections and we should spend our finite resources on political operations and actually winning elections and paying any candidate's legal fees, or frankly any other outside fees or expenses is not the RNC's job. "
He continued that after asking donors to send their $28, it "would be totally misleading to take that money and then go and spend it with some big fat law firm's legal fees for something that has nothing to do with winning the election cycle."
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"And Henry, forgive me, you know it happened until Trump became a candidate this cycle, the RNC was already paying his legal bills from when he was president," Bash interrupted. "
"At least $1.6 million of those donor funds that you were talking about have already gone for those law firms to lawyers to help his legal fees," she added as he nodded.
"Trump adviser Chris LaCivita, who is expected to move into the RNC, released a statement saying, 'The primary is over & it is the RNC’s sole responsibility to defeat Joe Biden & win back the WH. Efforts to delay that assist Joe Biden in the destruction of our nation. Republicans cannot stand on the sidelines and allow this to happen.' What's your response?'
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"Chris LaCivita is a good man, he's a good operative, he just happens to be wrong," a grim-faced Barbour replied.
"The RNC has laid out the rules and the process on the primary schedule. Once a candidate gets to 1,215 delegates, then you have a majority of the delegates and you can become the presumptive nominee and run things. They're jumping ahead of the game. We've got four states that voted, it's just, like I say, changing the rules in the middle of the game and I don't think it's right. But I do respect LaCivita. He's very good at what he does and a lot of the Trump campaign is very talented, so I appreciate that."
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