According to various media outlets, President Donald Trump’s campaign made a $50,000 payment last month to the attorney representing Donald Trump Jr. The payment, dated June 27, was made to the Law Offices of Alan Futerfas, for “Legal consulting.” Other records show payment to the law firm of Jones Day, which represented Trump’s campaign during the 2016 presidential election.
The controversy over fees will likely grow if there continues to be this lack of transparency.
The story about Donald Jr. does raise an interesting legal issue. There is an obvious potential conflict with the campaign to the extent that the campaign did not sign off on meeting with someone who said that they were Russian government lawyers bringing information directly from the Russian government to influence the presidential election. Donald Trump Jr. did not hold any formal position with the campaign that I know of, but, more importantly, the payment of the fees suggests that his actions with regard to the Russian lawyers was attributable to some extent to the campaign. Of course, the involvement of Paul Manafort in the meeting did encompass a campaign official. There is no indication that Manafort’s fees are being covered by the campaign.
It is certainly legal to use campaign funds to pay for legal services, which has been interpreted broadly in the past. However, that does not answer questions over the appearance of legal and political conflicts of interest.