Donald Trump Campaign Emails Use Misleading Subject Lines, Spam-Like Senders
Promotional emails sent on behalf of former President Donald Trump and his allies have used misleading senders and subject lines to bait their own supporters, amid aggressive GOP campaigns to take back Congress and the presidency.
Since President Joe Biden's 2020 win, Trump's Save America Political Action Committee (PAC) has been prolific in its output of emails containing guilt-tripping calls for donations, key Trumpist talking points (including false election fraud claims), and attacks on his successor.
However, a number of these messages—in addition to the email blasts by Trump allies that Save America subscribers were automatically signed up to—have gone a step further by using seemingly deceptive practices.
Dozens of emails from Trump's PAC feign direct exchanges with the recipients, using senders such as "Donald J. Trump, me," "You, Trump," or "me, Donald Trump, Jr."
Other fundraising emails were crafted to appear as forwarded messages, without mentioning Trump. One template has "fwd: yours truly" as the sender and "fwd: fwd: me, you" as the subject line. Another is sent by "automatic email fwd," with the subject line "It looks like you MISSED our email."
Several Trump campaign emails soliciting donations also put their sender down as "This must be a mistake."
Newsweek has reached out to Trump's office for comment.
Republican congressional candidates endorsed by Trump have also followed suit.
One email sent by the re-election campaign of Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) lists its sender as "Reservation Confirmation," with the subject line "FLIGHT NUMBER: 8341." The message itself states the former president has "invited you to join him for a private dinner at Mar-a-Lago!"
A click to the "Confirm your interest here" button redirects the recipient to a fundraiser offering a chance to win the dinner with Trump. Donations will benefit Blackburn's campaign, in addition to that of Congresswoman Elise Stefanik (R-NY).
Some emails from the team of Representative Steve Scalise (R-LA) cryptically appear as coming from a sender simply named "Steve," with the subject line "hey." Scalise's fundraising emails have also put down "URGENT RESPONSE REQUIRED" as senders. Scalise is the House Minority Whip Representative.
In an email paid for by the Republican State Leadership Committee, which works to help Republicans gain control of state legislatures, the sender is "Me, Trump State Allies (2)"—appearing to imply a back-and-forth conversation—and the subject line is "re: @realDonaldTrump mentioned YOUR name!"
The body of the email reads, "In order for that to happen, Trump's State Allies need to know if you are planning on joining President Trump's new social media app!" The call, presumably to join Trump's yet-to-launch Truth Social, leads to a fundraiser webpage.
Another email, this time by the National Republican Congressional Committee—a political committee that seeks to elect Republicans to the House of Representatives—listed its sender as "Urgent Message," with the subject line: "We've reached out DOZENS of times & you've ignored us."
The message itself urged supporters to "accept Trump's friend request right now" or else "his social site WILL FAIL."
The "Accept" button led to another donation page.
On Thursday, the Save America PAC announced Trump's first rally in 2022, which will be held at the Country Thunder Festival Grounds in Florence, Arizona on January 15.
