Charles Koch-Tied Group Seeks to Block Trump From GOP Nomination

Bill Allison
·2 min read
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(Bloomberg) -- A super political action committee with close ties to billionaire Charles Koch raised $78 million in the first half of 2023, money the group is using to try and prevent former President Donald Trump from becoming the Republican nominee.

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Americans for Prosperity Action received the bulk of its funding from two $25 million donations, according to its latest filing with the Federal Election Commission, one from Koch Industries Inc. and the second from Stand Together Chamber of Commerce, a political nonprofit that doesn’t disclose its donors.

The conservative group opposes Trump and has run ads saying his nomination will lead to Democratic President Joe Biden’s reelection in 2024 and pointing out that under the former president, Republicans lost control of the three elected branches of government. It has spent a little less than $600,000 so far on digital and satellite ads attacking Trump, according to AdImpact. The group has yet to back any of Trump’s challengers for the nomination.

The super political action committee also received $5 million from billionaires Rob Walton and Jim Walton, both heirs of Walmart Inc. And Ron Cameron, a major GOP donor who supported Trump in 2020, gave $1 million.

Americans for Prosperity Action spent $4 million and ended June with $75 million cash on hand. The substantial sum, which is more than twice as much as the Trump campaign raised in the second quarter, is a headwind for the former president as he seeks to return to the White House.

Still, he remains the GOP frontrunner, with 54% support in the RealClearPolitics average of polls. Trump is nearly 36 points ahead of the second-place contender, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is the only other candidate polling in double digits.

Read more: Trump Widens Lead Over Flagging DeSantis Among Likely GOP Voters

Americans for Prosperity Action’s $78 million is part of a growing pile of Republican-allied money seeking to defeat Trump. PACs allied with the anti-tax group Club for Growth also have been raising millions of dollars to look for an alternative to the GOP standard bearer.

Charles Koch, and his late brother David, who died in 2019, have been some of the largest Republican donors in recent decades but never warmed to Trump. The brothers’ political network refused to financially back him as far back as 2016, which led the former president to call the Koch brothers “a total joke” and “highly overrated.”

Americans For Prosperity Action spent more than $69 million in the 2022 midterms, with the vast majority off that money supporting Republican candidates, according to analysis from OpenSecrets. Some of the biggest recipients of the group’s support were Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker and Mehmet Oz, who was running for Senate in Pennsylvania. Both were candidates Trump endorsed.

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