Campaign finance experts question whether Dallas billionaire's pro-Trump super PAC violates law

WASHINGTON — In early August, Donald Trump named billionaire Dallas banker Andy Beal to his campaign’s economic advisory council. About a month later, Beal, who has been friendly with the New York real estate mogul for several years, created a political committee that spent $1 million on advertisements supporting Trump’s campaign.

To some campaign finance experts, the arrangement raises questions about whether Beal’s super PAC — called Save America From Its Government — is violating regulations that prohibit coordination between the campaign and outside groups.

But without stronger evidence that the campaign offered explicit guidance on the advertisements, Beal would probably be in the clear, others say, pointing to the murkiness of laws governing the big-dollar campaign groups.

“Certainly at the very least it creates an opportunity where someone has a foot in both worlds, it creates the possibility that that might happen,” said Ian Vandewalker, counsel for the Brennan Center at New York University law school. “But it doesn’t necessarily tell you that that is in fact happening.”

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