Who is Donald Trump’s reclusive new mega-donor, Timothy Mellon?

Even before his recent donation to the Trump campaign, Mr Mellon has a history of donating to conservative candidates and causes.

In 2010, Mr Mellon donated about $1.5m to the state of Arizona to defray the legal costs to defend SB 1070, a controversial anti-immigration bill.

More recently, Mr Mellon helped bankroll Texas governor Greg Abbott’s construction of a wall along the Mexican border, providing more than $53m for the project in 2021.

He also has given money to various Republican-aligned super PACS – or “political action committees” – to support conservative candidates.

Mr Mellon highlighted some of his political views when he wrote a self-published 2015 memoir. In it, he condemned what he termed “Slavery Redux” social safety net programmes.

Mr Mellon also wrote that black voters were awarded “freebies” in exchange for “delivering votes”. He claimed this “largess” is “funded by the hardworking folks…who are too honest or too proud to allow themselves to sink into this morass”.

In exchange, he claimed, black Americans became “more belligerent” and “slaves of a new master, Uncle Sam”.

Mr Mellon, however, has occasionally made small donations to Democrats, including $2,700 for progressive New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s 2018 campaign.

He told Bloomberg News, external in 2020 that she tried to return the donation, but that he refused to cash the cheque.

Mr Mellon also expressed admiration for Trump during that rare interview, telling Bloomberg that “he’s done the things he promised to, or tried to do the things he’s promised to.”

Trump’s most notable achievement, according to Mr Mellon, was “in trade and righting the balance between our country and the rest of the world, especially China”.