Trump Trial Witnesses Got Big Raises From His Campaign and Businesses: Report

At least nine witnesses in Donald Trump’s various criminal trials received huge pay raises, generous severance packages, new job offers, and other financial benefits from the Trump campaign and other Trump businesses, a ProPublica investigation found. Those spoils reportedly included one campaign aide who saw his average pay double to $53,500 per month, another employee who received a $2 million severance package that prevented him from voluntarily cooperating with law enforcement, and a lucrative new job on the Trump campaign for the daughter of a high-level official. Perks like these could be evidence of witness tampering, ProPublica reported, although it would be hard to prove in court because prosecutors would need to show that the benefits were intended to influence testimony, and not just exceptional rewards for good work. ProPublica found no evidence that Trump himself approved the benefits, but he’s famously tight on spending and his operations have been described by a former aide as similar to a “small family business” where everyone “in some sense reports to Mr. Trump.”