How Nikki Haley’s Campaign Inflated Her Fund-Raising Haul

Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador, has staked her presidential run on an image as a straight shooter, with experience and drama-free competence.

This weekend, though, it became clear that the impressive early fund-raising numbers her campaign promoted this month had been inflated, apparently because of double-counted money.

The campaign had broadcast an $11 million haul in its opening six weeks, through the end of the first-quarter filing period on March 31. But when three of her affiliated committees filed reports on Saturday, the math did not add up.

Instead, the three committees appeared to have taken in about $8.3 million, including $2.7 million that one of the committees transferred to two other committees and that was double-counted in the overall figure.

On Saturday, a spokeswoman for Ms. Haley said other campaigns had accounted for their money similarly in the past.

How can this happen?

The muddied accounting exposes the risks of building a campaign-finance operation with a patchwork of committees, which has become standard for presidential candidates.

Ms. Haley is backed by four affiliated entities registered with the Federal Election Commission, three of which made filings on Saturday.

Team Stand for America, her joint fund-raising committee, solicits contributions that are then divided between three entities: her presidential campaign committee, a multicandidate political action committee and a hybrid PAC (which did not file on Saturday).

According to its filing on Saturday, Team Stand for America raised nearly $4.3 million in contributions in the first quarter. It also transferred $2.7 million to affiliated committees, and here is where the math got tricky. Without those transfers, the total raised by the three committees was $8.3 million, not $11 million.

More details, please

Ms. Haley’s principal campaign committee — Nikki Haley for President — disclosed that it had taken in $5.1 million in receipts. But only $3.3 million of that sum came from contributions: The remaining $1.8 million came from Team Stand for America in two transfers recorded on March 31, the filings show.

Stand for America PAC, a group that supports her but can also raise money for other candidates, reported $1.5 million in receipts — but just $600,000 of that came from contributions, the filing shows. The PAC received $886,000 in transferred money from Team Stand for America on March 31.

In offering the original $11 million figure, the campaign added up the total receipts for the three groups — $5.1 million, $4.3 million and $1.5 million — without accounting for the fact that $2.7 million was being moved between the groups.

What does it mean?

Not much. There is nothing inaccurate about the filings themselves — they appear to add up — and there is nothing new about campaigns overhyping their fund-raising.

And $8.3 million is still a sizable haul for the first six weeks of a presidential campaign. In comparison, former President Donald J. Trump’s campaign disclosed $9.5 million in receipts in January for the first six weeks of his official bid.

A spokeswoman for Ms. Haley did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.

In 2021, Mr. Trump’s advisers announced, inaccurately, that his affiliated political committees had raised nearly $82 million in the first six months of the year. That figure improperly counted at least $23 million in transfers to new political action committees from other accounts, The New York Times found.

Mr. Trump’s joint campaign committee — which has been the main vessel for his fund-raising this election cycle — raised $18.8 million in the first quarter, his campaign has said. It transferred $14 million to his principle campaign committee, according to filings Saturday.