The Contemporary Presidency: “Was the “Deep State” Out to Get President Trump? Evidence from Campaign Contributions from F.B.I. Personnel”

Abstract

Was the "deep state" truly "out to get" President Donald Trump during his presidency? This article addresses this question by examining the federal campaign contributing behavior of the deepest of allegedly "deep state" actors-employees of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (F.B.I.). Our findings, showing that F.B.I. employees contributed vanishingly low sums of money during the Trump years and that those who did make contributions tended to support President Trump, suggest that the F.B.I. was not out to destroy the president.Why do individuals and groups make campaign contributions? In recent years, enhanced computing power, the easy availability of campaign finance data, and improved research designs have led us toward conclusive answers to this question. We have learned, for example, that individuals are generally consumptive contributors who give for ideological reasons (