What exactly did Event Strategies Inc. and American Made Media Consultants invoice the Trump campaign for around January 2021?
Executive summary
Around January 2021 the Trump political operation invoiced and routed substantial sums to two different vendors for distinct services: Event Strategies Inc. billed the campaign and allied committees for event-production, stage management and advance logistics tied to rallies (including people listed on the Jan. 6 permit), while American Made Media Consultants (AMMC) was used as a media-and-messaging clearinghouse that handled massive ad and text-message spending — including a reported six-figure disbursement for Jan. 6 SMS — though the full details remain shadowed by complex routing and legal complaints [1] [2] [3] [4] [5].
1. Event production and on-the-ground logistics: who was paid and why
Records and reporting show Event Strategies Inc., the firm run by Justin Caporale (identified as the campaign’s advance director) and Tim Unes (the rally stage manager), was paid by the Trump campaign and joint fundraising committees for event production, staffing, scheduling and stage management related to the rallies that culminated in the January 6 demonstration; the firm was named on the permit for the Ellipse event and its principals are listed among operations managers tied to that permit [1] [6] [7].
2. Dollar totals tied to Event Strategies — numbers that are clear and numbers that are not
Different outlets and campaign-finance trackers put the amounts in overlapping but not identical frames: Newsweek reported Event Strategies received more than $1.7 million from the re-election campaign and joint fundraising committee [1], while OpenSecrets and other trackers calculate the broader Trump political operation paid Event Strategies more than $2.5 million starting in 2020, with roughly $800,000 of that flowing from Save America and related PACs in 2021 — figures that capture payments beyond the immediate pre‑Jan. 6 window [2] [4].
3. American Made Media Consultants: a clearinghouse for media buys and SMS
AMMC functioned as an internal clearinghouse for ads, mobile services and other media-related spending; reporting shows the Trump campaign and joint fundraising committee routed enormous sums through AMMC during the 2020 cycle — reported as roughly $769–771 million — and that some of those line items included SMS/text messaging and mobile-app disbursements, with specific entries tied to Jan. 6 texting [4] [8] [5].
4. The Jan. 6 text-message line item and what was invoiced
OpenSecrets and contemporaneous press reporting identify a discrete payment into AMMC for text messaging on Jan. 6: roughly $222,000 was routed by the Trump joint fundraising committee to AMMC for SMS operations tied to that day, and FEC‑linked documents list disbursements to AMMC described as “SMS,” supporting the conclusion that AMMC invoiced the campaign for large-scale texting services around January 6 [3] [5] [2].
5. Allegations, defenses and the remaining opacity
Campaign Legal Center and other watchdogs have accused the campaign of using AMMC and related entities to obscure who was ultimately paid — a complaint that alleges laundering or improper routing of hundreds of millions through shell companies — while campaign sources have said AMMC was created to buy ads directly and eliminate middlemen; the reporting establishes the routing and specific line items (event production, stage management, SMS, media buys) but also documents unanswered questions about the ultimate recipients and precise invoicing details for many transactions [8] [9] [10].
6. What can be stated with confidence — and what cannot
It is verifiable from public reporting and disclosed disbursements that Event Strategies billed for event production and logistics tied to rallies and that AMMC billed for media services including SMS (with a reported ~$222,000 SMS entry for Jan. 6), and that Event Strategies received at least $1.7 million and possibly upwards of $2.5 million from Trump-related committees over the period in question; beyond those line-item descriptions, investigators and reporters continue to note gaps in the public record about exact invoices, beneficiaries behind AMMC’s pass‑throughs and the full ledger of pre‑ and post‑Jan. 6 payments [1] [2] [3] [4] [7].