Mike Stone/Reuters
Donald Trump donated $35,000 to Greg Abbott’s Texas gubernatorial campaign after Abbott’s attorney general’s office dropped a $5.4 million probe into Trump University, the Associated Press reports. The lawsuit was dropped by the Texas Attorney General’s Office in 2010, when Abbott served as attorney general of the state. His office had opened an investigation of “possibly deceptive trade practices,” but let the civil probe go when the Trump school ended its operations in the Lone Star State. Afterward, the real-estate mogul poured $35,000 into Abbott’s successful gubernatorial bid.
Abbott’s then-deputy attorney general, David Morales, told The Dallas Morning News on Friday that he’d decided on his own not to pursue the lawsuit—without input from his boss. An ex-staffer had told the Morning News that the decision to drop the suit was “a political one.” But Morales said, “I did not discuss this matter with Gen. Abbott or Daniel Hodge [then-first assistant attorney general] … prior to making my decision.” He added, “Any suggestion otherwise is false.” The lawsuit had claimed the Trump school taught “useless information” to Texans as it wasn’t relevant to the state’s housing market.