Donald Trump has spent much of his presidential campaign bashing his GOP rivals as beholden to major donors, and, in recent weeks, he’s expanded his attacks to include three major donors in particular ― Sheldon Adelson, Paul Singer and the Koch brothers.

But POLITICO has learned that Trump or his surrogates have sought to build relationships ― if not support ― from all three, calling into question the billionaire real estate showman’s repeated assertions that, because of his wealth, he has no use for major donors.


Trump’s courtship of Adelson, a Las Vegas casino mogul and ardent Zionist, involved “a very clear ask for money,” said a source close to Adelson, who noted the request came even as Trump was publicly declaring that he didn’t need donors’ money. “It was an odd ask.”

Trump personally called Adelson and had his staff attempt to set up a meeting in Vegas.

After declaring his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination in June, Trump called Adelson to tout his pro-Israel bona fides, according to sources familiar with the call. They say Trump mentioned that he lives in heavily Jewish New York and that his daughter married a Jewish man, real estate developer Jared Kushner.

Two separate sources close to Trump’s campaign added that his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, reached out to Adelson’s political adviser, Andy Abboud, to set up a face-to-face July meeting in Las Vegas between their bosses.

Adelson later backed out. And last month, when POLITICO reported that Adelson was leaning toward supporting the GOP presidential campaign of Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, whose hawkish foreign policy views align closely with Adelson’s, Trump lashed out at the senator and his potential patron.

“Sheldon Adelson is looking to give big dollars to Rubio because he feels he can mold him into his perfect little puppet. I agree!” Trump tweeted.

A similar pattern unfolded with Singer, a politically influential New York hedge fund billionaire who also is an ardent Israel hawk. Back in March, when Trump was still publicly toying with running for president, Kushner reached out to one of Singer’s representatives to try to broker a meeting between the representative and Trump, according to a source familiar with the interaction. Kushner indicated that Trump was laying the groundwork for a campaign and suggested Singer’s representative might want to hear about the plans, according to the source.

The entreaties, which did not result in a meeting, came after Kushner attended a March event at Singer’s office at which the billionaire and other donors had the chance to meet with Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who was then exploring a presidential campaign of his own.

But a few days after Singer declared his support for Rubio on Friday, Trump went on the attack.

At a Tuesday news conference, Trump declared ominously that there’s a “lotta controversy with Mr. Singer” and suggested “There are those people who probably wouldn’t have wanted him to back, but we’ll see.”

In other appearances this week, Trump predicted that Singer’s backing could hurt Rubio, given the billionaire’s support for a 2013 immigration reform effort championed by Rubio that some Republican activists still hold against him.

“This man Singer that put up money? He’s big on amnesty, he’s big on illegal immigration, Trump said Wednesday at a rally in Concord, New Hampshire, where he had filed papers to appear on the ballot for the state’s first-in-the-nation primary. “Paul Singer. Take a look at what he represents. And he represents other things, beside. Paul Singer represents amnesty and he represents illegal immigration pouring into the country. And now he’s with Rubio,” added Trump, whose top campaign issue is stopping illegal immigration and deporting undocumented immigrants.

The operatives behind a super PAC dedicated to supporting Trump’s campaign last month closed up shop after Trump disavowed their efforts. But before that, POLITICO revealed that Trump had attended a fundraiser for the super PAC, which maintained close connections to Trump's campaign. While Trump's campaign has raised most of its cash from small donors, the super PAC could have accepted huge donations from wealthy donors.

Yet, in a refrain that’s become familiar to those who’ve followed his surprisingly strong candidacy, Trump on Wednesday inveighed against rival candidates who have been more than happy to have the backing of super PACs funded by huge checks from wealthy supporters.

“We don’t want anybody to form super PACs for me. We sent legal notices: ‘Please give all the money back.’ We don’t want it,” he said. “If you look at Jeb, if you look at Marco Rubio, if you look at all of these people, they have super [PACs]. And you look at Hillary ― let’s go to the other side ― they have super PACs, where they control the candidate just like you control a puppet.”

Yet the sources close to the Trump campaign said that it went to great lengths to cast the candidate as an Israel supporter to appeal to Singer, Adelson and other similarly minded megadonors. In its interactions with Adelson’s representatives, the campaign highlighted a campaign ad Trump cut in 2013 urging Israeli voters to reelect their hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is a favorite of Adelson’s. “We had really tried to promote Trump as pro-Israel,” the source said. “He’s always wanted Adelson money.”

Trump’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment; neither did representatives for Singer or the billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch.

The Trump campaign sought access to the political and public policy network helmed by the Koch brothers. Trump’s aides detailed his policy positions for the Kochs and their donors in a survey put together by Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce, the group that coordinates the Koch network and hosts its twice-a-year donor gatherings.

But when Trump was not among the five candidates invited to the Koch donor gathering in August at which the survey was distributed to donors, he unleashed some serious snark at his rivals who were included ― Rubio, Walker, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz and Carly Fiorina.

“I wish good luck to all of the Republican candidates that traveled to California to beg for money etc. from the Koch Brothers. Puppets?” he tweeted.

Trump took another shot at Charles Koch this week after the billionaire was asked during interviews promoting a new book about his thoughts on the GOP presidential field.

Koch “is looking for a new puppet after Governor Walker and Jeb Bush cratered. He now likes Rubio—next fail,” Trump tweeted, though Koch has yet to direct any financial support to any of those candidates’ campaigns.

Interestingly, the Trump campaign employs several operatives who once worked for entities within the Koch network, including the campaign manager, Lewandowski, who served as the New Hampshire state director and in other positions for the Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity.

“The reason we hired Corey is we thought he could help us with Koch,” said one of the sources close to the Trump campaign.