Ken Griffin and Paul Singer met with Trump to donate to his campaign

Neither Singer nor Griffin have made a commitment, and no decision has been made on whether to contribute to Trump’s re-election, said the people, who requested anonymity to discuss private conversations.

Griffin met with Trump two weeks ago at Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, DC, one person said. Singer also had a separate meeting with Trump in recent weeks, the people said.

A spokesman for Citadel’s Griffin declined to comment. Representatives for Singer, founder of Elliott Investment Management, did not respond to requests for comment.

Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, has donated a significant amount to a political action committee close to Trump. Signing up Griffin and Singer as donors would be another major financial and symbolic victory for Trump.

The two hedge fund managers are among the Republicans’ most prolific supporters and have never financially supported Trump’s other presidential candidacies.

Both have been highly critical of the former president. Singer warned in 2016 that Trump’s trade ideas would guarantee a “global depression,” and Griffin called the former president a “triple loser” in 2022 after Republicans performed poorly in that year’s midterm elections.

Griffin said in May that he would wait to see who Trump would nominate for vice president before deciding whether to support his candidacy. Trump is expected to name a running mate in the next few days.

The presumptive Republican nominee’s fundraising struggled in the early stages of his campaign, but he has received a flood of campaign contributions in recent weeks, immediately following his felony conviction and stumbling President Joe Biden, who is facing calls from Democrats to drop out of the race.

Both Griffin and Singer are among the largest political donors in U.S. history, according to OpenSecrets. Since 2015, Griffin has donated $233 million to federal elections, while Singer has donated $89 million.

They have often supported the same political action committees and candidates, including at the presidential level. Both donated $5 million to former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley’s Super PAC, supporting her unsuccessful challenge to Trump for the Republican nomination.

Both also donated to Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, one of the possible candidates for Trump’s running mate when he ran against Trump in the 2016 Republican presidential primary. Singer also donated $2.5 million that same year to a super PAC attacking Trump in a last-ditch effort to persuade Republican voters in the primaries to choose another candidate.

According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Griffin is worth $41.8 billion, while Singer is worth only $4 billion.