GOP megadonor holds DeSantis fundraiser alongside former Trump officials
Reese Gorman
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After supporting former President Donald Trump in his past elections, GOP megadonor and energy mogul Harold Hamm will host a fundraiser for Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) in Oklahoma City Monday night.
The event will take place at Oklahoma City Golf and Country Club and is stacked with a number of high-profile GOP donors and Republican players in Oklahoma, including a former Trump White House official and Trump appointee, according to an invite obtained by the Washington Examiner.
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This will be the second fundraiser Hamm has been a part of for DeSantis, having attended one in Dallas earlier this summer.
Hamm served as an energy adviser to Trump during his first campaign in 2016 and at one point was considered for the role of energy secretary. Ultimately, Hamm turned down the opportunity. Hamm also lobbied Trump to pick Scott Pruitt, Oklahoma’s former attorney general, to be head of the Environmental Protection Agency.
But now, Hamm appears to be supporting DeSantis.
Also attending the event will be Gov. Kevin Stitt (R-OK), who is the only governor in the country to have endorsed DeSantis, and Alex Gray, who previously served in the Trump administration as the deputy assistant to the president and chief of staff of the National Security Council at the White House.
Gray said that while he has great respect for Trump and believes they did great work while in office, he believes it’s time for a new person, and that is DeSantis.
“I think the question now that has to be asked is, who is the right person to continue that legacy and to expand that legacy?” Gray said. “And what I have found for Governor DeSantis is a person that’s extraordinarily disciplined, has picked a series of issues, and has executed on them in a way that is extraordinarily effective. I think that I just keep coming back to one word, and it’s discipline, and I think he’s got the discipline to be the commander in chief.”
In addition, a former Trump appointee attending the event is Trent Shores, the former U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Oklahoma, according to the invitation. Shores was nominated by Trump in 2017 to be the U.S. attorney for the district and was confirmed by the Senate. He served in that role until 2021.
Also attending are Dustin and Edward Hillary, who own Hillary Communications, a telecommunications company in Oklahoma. Both are major GOP donors in the state, with Dustin Hillary sitting on the Oklahoma State Board of Regents for Higher Education.
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“DeSantis is a little less controversial, and I believe he is the best fit for Oklahoma,” Dustin Hillary said. “For the business community in Oklahoma, Desantis is the best choice out of the field that’s here.”
Officials for Trump and DeSantis’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment. A representative for Hamm also did not respond to a request for comment.
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