Nikki Haley says Trump wants to 'control' the RNC and use it as a 'piggy bank' for his legal battles

Former President Donald Trump, left, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. AP Photo/Matt Rourke; AP Photo/Charles Krupa

• Nikki Haley is concerned about Trump’s effort to reshape the RNC’s leadership.
• “We see him trying to get control of the RNC, so he can continue not to have to pay his own legal fees,” she told CNN.
• Trump’s fundraising committees spent roughly $50 million in 2023 on legal fees, FEC filings show.

GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley on Friday warned that former President Donald Trump was aiming to “get control” of the Republican National Committee, adding that she didn’t want to see him use the committee as a “piggy bank” for his court fees.

While speaking on CNN, Haley told anchor Kaitlan Collins she was concerned about Trump’s push for new leadership at the RNC after a court found the ex-president liable for inflating his net worth and ordered him to pay nearly $355 million.

The interest on the payments alone could add roughly $100 million to that figure. And then there is the additional $83.3 million a court ordered Trump to pay writer E. Jean Carroll in January after a jury found he had damaged her reputation. Another court ordered Trump in a separate 2023 case to pay Carroll $5 million after he was found liable for sexual abuse.

“My biggest issue is I don’t want the RNC to become his legal defense fund. I don’t want the RNC to become his piggy bank for his personal court cases,” Haley said. “We’ve already seen him spend $50 million worth of campaign contributions toward his personal court cases.”

“Now we see him trying to get control of the RNC so he can continue not to have to pay his own legal fees,” Haley continued. “The problem is that doesn’t help us win any seat in the House, in the Senate, or anything else if the RNC is all focused on his legal fees. The RNC is practically broke now as it is.”

Trump has thrown his support behind North Carolina Republican Party chair Michael Whatley to succeed current RNC chair Ronna McDaniel, who is expected to leave after the February 24 South Carolina primary. The former president has also endorsed his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, to serve as cochair of the committee.

During the CNN interview, Haley railed against Trump’s increasingly visible involvement in RNC affairs.

“He’s trying to control the RNC after the fact that he tried to get me out of the race so that he could be the presumptive nominee,” she said. “All of that is so that he has an arm to pay his legal fees. That’s the fear that every Republican should have.”

Before Trump entered the GOP primary, the RNC in 2021 and 2022 paid out roughly $2 million to two law firms that were working on the former president’s cases.

Trump’s fundraising committees in 2023 spent about $50 million on his legal expenses, according to campaign finance reports.