Trump news today: Trump claims record-busting $50m haul from Florida fundraiser

Trump told conservative radio show host Hugh Hewitt earlier this week: “I think what happened is, you know, that white stuff that they happened to find, which happened to be cocaine in the White House, I don’t know, I think something’s going on there.

“I watched his State of the Union, and he was all jacked up at the beginning. By the end, he was fading fast. There’s something going on there.”

Former US first lady Melania Trump, who has largely been missing-in-action throughout her husband Donald Trump’s latest presidential run, is due to make her first campaign appearance of 2024 later this month – albeit without leaving the comfort of her own home.

According to Politico, Ms Trump will host a fundraiser for the Log Cabin Republicans (LCB) group on Saturday 20 April, an event being held at the Trumps’ Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach, Florida.

LCB describes itself as “the nation’s largest Republican organisation dedicated to representing LGBT conservatives and allies”.

Joe Sommerlad has the story:

The Trump campaign says that it raised $50.5m at a Saturday evening fundraiser in Palm Beach attended by the former president and wife Melania.

The Florida soiree was held at the mansion of billionaire hedge fund manager John Paulson, who hosted the event with his girlfriend Alina de Almeida.

Donald Trump has made the outrageous claim that President Joe Biden was on drugs when he delivered his barn-storming State of the Union address last month, without providing any evidence to substantiate the allegation.

Asked by Mr Hewitt about his probable rival, Mr Trump said: “I think what happened is, you know, that white stuff that they happened to find, which happened to be cocaine in the White House, I don’t know, I think something’s going on there.

“I watched his State of the Union, and he was all jacked up at the beginning. By the end, he was fading fast. There’s something going on there.”

Here’s what else he said:

The centrist group No Labels announced that it was ending its bid to generate support for a third-party bid for the 2024 presidential election cycle, ending a number of headaches for the Biden re-election campaign.

Members of the group, who had faced calls to disclose the fundraising backing the effort, said in a statement on Thursday that while Americans supposedly remain “open” to the concept of a third-party candidate, they had been unable to identify a credible and willing figure to take up that mantle.

In an interview on Fox News on Thursday, when pressed by Neil Cavuto on who he would vote for, No Labels National Director Joe Cunningham said he would vote for Joe Biden over Donald Trump.

Read John Bowden’s report:

Donald Trump is a man of simple pleasures: he likes steaks and Big Macs, model wives, massive skyscrapers and a sparkling chandelier dangling above his golden bidet.

And it turns out that’s actually not too far from the truth when it comes to the twice-impeached, four-times-indicted Republican presidential candidate’s musical taste too.

Joe Sommerlad has the story:

Donald Trump’s $175m bond in his New York civil fraud case has been thrown into doubt by New York Attorney General Letitia James after she filed a notice asking for evidence that the out-of-state firm that underwrote it really has the money to pay up.

In a Thursday afternoon filing, District Court Judge Aileen Cannon denied Mr Trump’s request to dismiss the case saying the counts in the indictment made, “no reference to the Presidential Records Act” and that it “does not provide a pre-trial basis to dismiss.”

Ariana Baio reports on the latest from Florida:

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee on Thursday denied the defendant’s latest attempt to delay or dismiss the case, saying the unsubstantiated claims of election fraud that the defendants made were allegedly, “in furtherance of criminal activity and constitute false statements knowingly and willfully made in matters within a government agency’s jurisdiction which threaten to deceive and harm the government.”