Posted on 08/25/2023 1:56:31 PM PDT by Golden Eagle
The indictments are all lawfare, either non-crimes or potential misdemeanors which are never prosecuted, but most people get their information from the mainstream media so they think Trump must be guilty of something.
Whether Trump’s fundraising outpaces his legal expenses by enough to be able to spend money on his campaign will determine whether he stays in the race. Much of his lead was created with a massive negative ad and influencer campaign worth tens of millions against DeSantis. When the money for that dries up, what will happen to his poll numbers, is a question whose answer is yet to be determined.
The revelation that Trump is launching a legal defense fund is causing me to want to really delve into this in a long form post.
I want to get a few disclaimers out of the way before we get going. I have no insider information and no sources. This is speculation based on my 25 years of experience in the tech sector working at times for start ups and also big tech companies.
My theory is that Trump is asset rich and cash poor. His businesses are worth a lot of money but they don’t make a lot of money. Some don’t make any money at all. In fact some I suspect one loses quite a lot of money.
This is where Truth Social comes in. In Trump’s FEC filings he indicated he owns 90% of Truth Social and has profited less than $200 on it. Truth Social is headquartered in Sarasota, FL and has an estimated 40 employees. It is hosted on Rumble’s cloud services and Cloudflare handles CDN duties.
We know that Devin Nunez, the CEO of Truth Social makes $750,000 a year but I suspect most of the 40 employees have salaries solidly in the six figure range. We can safely estimate that just payroll and benefits for Truth Social run about $10m a year.
We have no way of knowing what the contracts with Rumble or Cloudflare cost but I’m betting it’s in the ball park of $10-20m a year. If they know what they are doing. If not it could be much higher. Then they have the contract with the AI firm that scans and moderates Truth Social content. I have no idea what that costs but I am betting it is quite a lot. I am going to take a generous guess and say $5m a year.
All told we are looking at somewhere around $30-50m a year in operating expenses. Which wouldn’t normally be a problem but in 2016 when Trump “self funded” his campaign he put in right around $66m dollars. So I’m guessing Trump’s free cash flow per year is somewhere around $50-70m.
This sounds slim but manageable right? How did things go wrong? Well things went wrong when Elon decided to buy Twitter. That decision inadvertently destroyed the plans for Truth Social.
You see Trump was not supposed to be spending that $30-50m on Truth Social this year. You were. By that I mean Trump had plans to take Truth Social public and let stockholders fund his social media company.
That plan got nuked when Elon bought Twitter and half of the reason for switching to Truth Social evaporated overnight. The plan was to take Truth Social public through an acquisition by the publicly traded company DWAC (Digital World Acquisition Company). That merger was put on hold as soon as it became clear Twitter’s users were leaving Truth Social and returning to Twitter. Truth Social was initially valued at $700m dollars.
Not a bad plan all in all. Trump gets a fat paycheck to the tune of about $500m and now a nice base of liquid cash to use to pay for his looming legal defenses and stop gap anything necessary for his Presidential campaign.
The dissolution of that plan is causing Trump even more headaches than just the lost payday. He now has numerous regulatory bodies investigating the failed merger from different angles. This is costing a lot money for legal representation. How much? Not sure but I would be willing to bet it is around $10m a year.
Now Trump is really tight on his cash flow and he is stuck in a trap of his own making. He can’t do what he should do and let Truth Social die. That would be too much of a PR embarrassment right in the middle of his campaign. He won’t drop out of the Presidential race because he sees that as his major lifeline out of legal trouble. He however cannot pay his legal fees and keep Truth Social afloat without selling assets or getting help.
That is why his campaign has funded his legal defense. It’s the only way to keep him in the race and Truth Social alive. With these new indictments that probably won’t be enough so now we see the legal defense fund getting launched. If the fund doesn’t rake in enough money we may see Trump either fold Truth Social or bow out of the race.]
It might be true. There are some that want to see President Trump make fools of the prosecutors. It will be hard to filter the content in at least one of these cases.
What “people” want is irrelevant.
A valuable poll would be what LIKELY VOTERS want. But then, Politico wouldn’t get the results they want to push their narrative.
Golden Beagle has TDS.
That’s simply nuts. Frankly, if he prevails we are sunk. He’s already suggested suspending the constitution. If he prevails, the next nutty democrat will have the same powers as he wants. Think of President AOC with the powers he wants.
“According to a new POLITICO Magazine/Ipsos poll, 62% of people said they believe Trump should stand trial for his storage of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida,”
Riiiggghhhttt...
I Don’t suppose politico wasted NO ink on voters demanding pence, Obama, or biden to be indicted and tried for their “crimes” of possessing classified documents.
So be honest Golden Eagle, do you favor a two tiered justice system? Do you agree with this form of weaponized justice system as long as it’s not targeted toward ronny?
Do you believe Trump has committed crimes for which he is being targeted?
Do you believe this is or is not a politically motivated vendetta?
Yet another useless poll... Polls are like statistics, find the ones you like.
Now let’s do one from The Hill. These things always mean, “This percentage agrees with us and what Democrats do and want. We make up the numbers.”
60% of the people in DC support this kangaroo court.
Unless we set 2020 right...we’re done. Effectively we will have become the USSR where everyone “voted” in a “presidential election” the outcome subject to the whim of the Communist Party. And that situation will be upon us the rest of our lives, our children’s lives, and those of our grandchildren
bull crap!
“Golden Eagle” is irrational never Trumper. I wouldn’t spend much time thinking about whatever he posts.
So, it’s all about you, right?
...so I guess we can place you and Golden Eagle in the undecided column for a personalized Trump mug shirt?
And the irony? The NEVERTRUMPERS have the most to lose if Trump is defeated. They are the ones living in gated communities, with lots of money tied up in investments. It’s their neighborhoods that will be culturally enriched. It’s their investments that the democrats will seize to fund budget deficits.
Trump’s “dirty walmart shoppers” and “trailer trash” supporters will certainly suffer. But the NEVERTRUMPER country club conservatives? They’re going to get it GOOD and HARD!
Who wants to stand with the politically persecuted?
Most Americans are chicken in the face of government oppression.
So hay... government knows this and knows they can indict on specious charges and get the outcome they want. I will vote for Trump, and will say so and have.
When they eventually turn me into a poli-prisoner of the system, I hope one day I can face God and say, “At least I wasn’t a coward in the face of pure evil.”
“The only insane hatred is from those that are endlessly attacking me, for no longer supporting Trump for President, as I previously did here for years.”
I still support Trump but I gotta admit, some of the nastiest attacks I’ve seen on FR in a long time have been from Trump supporters toward non-supporters.
“People are confused and want this settled. Obviously.”
Not going to happen. This attack, like the impeachments and the countless other accusations the liberals have tossed at him, don’t hold water for any major crimes and are nothing more than an effort to smear him for the elections. If it is determined they don’t have anything worth skit prior to the primaries and general, he will look like Moses reincarnated and the light will shine on him like mercury. The libs will get hammered in the elections and a huge chance a number of liberal congressmen/women will go down with anyone connected to the libs over the next couple of elections before they can lie their way back into licitness. This is a gamble they can’t afford to take as it will cost them at least four years of Trump and whoever follows him. You probably won’t see anything happen on this until after the election when they can bow out without too much blood loss.
wy69
Yer just pathetic like Yer hero Ron DePathetic. 😃
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