This is a problem for a lot of political campaigns. The Associated Press did an investigation (https://apnews.com/article/trump-actblue-winred-fundraising-justice-department-3e73d4022bb47e0533f9dcfd35d37371) last year and found that the Trump campaign over the past five years had 1,600 contributions from donors who lived abroad, had close ties to foreign interests, or failed to disclose basic information, making it difficult -- if not impossible -- to identify them and verify the legality of their donations, Schweizer notes. Mayor Mamdani, the mayor of New York City, has a lot of support in the Muslim community. National News Desk reported that in his 2025 campaign, he received $13,000 in donations from 170 foreign donors. Those are just the ones that were detected.

This shows that political campaigns ignore where money comes from, Schweizer says. Cash is cash as far as they're concerned.

The hosts close the show on a key question: Is foreign money a major problem in American elections?

At GAI, our researchers spend a lot of time reading foreign language press reports, Schweizer explains. What you see when you spend time reading that material is that [foreign governments] are watching the politics in the US very closely… They want one side to win; they want another side not to win.

One of the members of the royal family of Qatar put up on her social media accounts how people can donate to Mamdani, he adds.

It matters more now than it did before, Eggers says.



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