Former Secretary of State and First Lady Hillary Clinton accused President Donald Trump on Monday of spending public money on political messaging while sitting on a personal fortune and a massive campaign war chest. Her post on X landed as the White House faces bipartisan scrutiny over a series of television ads that ethics experts say may violate federal law, and as the U.S.-Iran war and rising prices weigh on Republicans six weeks before the November midterms.
Clinton’s Post
Clinton posted the message at 11:05 a.m. on Monday, September 28, 2026. In full, it reads:
“Not content with the $2 billion he made last year and the $400 million in his super PAC, Trump is using your money to run pro-MAGA ads before the midterms.”
The post links to a New York Times report published Sunday, headlined “A Trump 2024 Campaign Ad Returns, Now Brought to You by the Government.” The Times reported that the ad, which ethics experts said could violate federal law, shows Trump vowing to “expel the warmongers” from government and fight the “deep state,” even as he wages a war with Iran.
The Ad at the Center of the Dispute
The spot is nearly identical to a black-and-white ad Trump ran during his 2024 campaign. In it, he walks silently down a hallway and declares that “this is the final battle.” According to the Times, it returned over the weekend on television stations nationwide with one change: the closing words “Paid for by the U.S. Government.” NBC News reported that the new version omits the final seconds of the 2024 original, which urged viewers to join Trump’s fight and displayed his campaign logo.
The ad aired during “Fox News Sunday,” “Saturday Night Live” and several college and NFL football games, including Seahawks-Commanders and Ohio State-Illinois, according to the ad-analytics firm AdImpact. It is the third pro-Trump spot to identify government funding in recent days. The first, set to the song “Love Me,” showed Trump vowing to defeat “socialism and communism and Marxism.” The second used footage from his July 4 speech at Mount Rushmore. The Times reported that AdImpact’s estimates put spending on the three ads above $1 million, though the government has not disclosed the cost. Later estimates for the latest spot have run higher than the Times’ early figure.
The $2 Billion and $400 Million Figures
Both figures in Clinton’s post trace to public records. Trump reported at least $2.1 billion in income, revenue and other proceeds last year, according to his financial disclosure made public by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, with more than half tied to cryptocurrency. That disclosure was released June 30. Trump told reporters the stock market was going up and everybody was profiting when asked about the earnings, and a White House spokesperson said neither he nor his family has engaged in conflicts of interest, according to reports.
The $400 million refers to MAGA Inc., Trump’s flagship super PAC. It ended August with about $415.8 million in cash, according to a Federal Election Commission filing, up from $403.5 million at the start of the month. On September 4, Trump said he plans to allocate $400 million to $500 million from his political operation to help Republican candidates, and claimed the PAC holds close to a billion dollars, a figure well above what the filing shows. Trump described the money at that event as money he controls.
Ethics Experts Sound the Alarm
Several ethics lawyers told the Times the latest ad could violate federal law. Norm Eisen, a former Obama White House ethics counsel who has sued the Trump administration several times, said the administration has gone from breaking the law to trampling it, and that the new ad openly repurposes prior political conduct. Richard Painter, a former ethics lawyer under President George W. Bush, said using federal funds this way could be an abuse of power and an impeachable offense, and urged Congress to demand reimbursement.
Experts pointed to federal appropriations law barring taxpayer money for propaganda and, separately, to the Hatch Act of 1939. The president is exempt from the Hatch Act, but the experts said government employees who worked on the ads or their placement could have run afoul of it. Margaret Dylus-Yukins of the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan watchdog, said a divisive campaign commercial paid for by the government defies the law’s purpose. Painter also rejected the White House’s historical comparisons, noting that a 2004 Government Accountability Office finding held a Bush-era Medicare ad violated the propaganda ban, though he said that case was far less flagrant.
Congressional Pushback From Both Parties
On Thursday, Senators Patty Murray and Jack Reed and Representatives Rosa DeLauro, the top Democrat on House Appropriations, and Steny Hoyer sent a letter to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles. They demanded the ads come down and asked for their production and airtime costs. The letter compared the spots to propaganda expected in North Korea and called them an illegal misuse of taxpayer dollars.
Republicans have also voiced concern. Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” that no public official should spend public money on private ads for themselves. Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina compared the use of taxpayer money to former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and called it inappropriate.
The White House Defense
The White House has rejected the criticism. In a statement it reissued Sunday, it called the spots “public service announcements” that remind Americans to love their country and understand what makes it worth defending “at home, at our borders, and abroad.” A White House official said the ads are clearly not political, that Trump is not on the ballot, and that they carry no call to action. The White House website hosts a page defending the campaign, citing past administrations’ public messaging, including World War I and World War II-era appeals, a Bush Medicare ad and the Biden COVID-19 vaccination push.
Midterm Stakes and the War Backdrop
The ad’s message, promising to expel “warmongers” from government, is airing while the administration continues a war against Iran with no clear resolution in sight, according to the Times. Trump’s low approval ratings and a war that has driven up prices threaten Republican hopes of holding Congress in November. On Polymarket, the leading outcome for control of the House is the Democratic Party at 93 percent, with the Republican Party at 8 percent. Prediction-market odds move constantly, and earlier in September Polymarket had Democrats at 86 percent.
Clinton, the Democratic nominee Trump defeated in 2016, framed the dispute in her post as a matter of whose money is funding the message. Her post drew on the same public figures cited above: Trump’s reported 2025 income, MAGA Inc.’s cash reserves and the government-paid ads. The White House has not directly addressed the ad’s near-identical match to Trump’s 2024 campaign spot, according to NBC News.