Washington Post complains that Donald Trump is raising money.

And it slanders those who are giving it to him.

Last week, Joe Biden raised $25 million in one star-studded fundraiser in New York City. Donald Trump was also in the NYC area attending a wake for the police officer shot by a criminal who had been arrested more than 20 times.

Trump won’t be able to match the Biden financial juggernaut. However, he is starting to bring in money from some rich Republican/conservative donors. They are “coming home” to their party. That’s normal.

It’s also good for America. “Our democracy” would be ill-served by a presidential campaign in which one of the two major-party candidates is awash in money while the other is strapped for funds (just as it is ill-served by a campaign in which one candidate is bogged down in endless and costly courtroom proceedings).

That’s not how the Washington Post sees things, though. Thus, the Post took time out from cheerleading the Trump prosecutions to bemoan the fact that some big Republican donors are holding their noses and contributing to Trump’s campaign.

Why are the donors doing this? Probably because they agree with Bill that “life is choosing,” and have concluded that Trump, for all his sins, is a better choice for president than Biden.

That’s not how the Post sees it, though. Its reporters insist:

The shift [from opposing Trump to now giving him money] reflects many conservative billionaires’ fears of President Biden’s tax agenda, which if approved would drastically reduce their fortunes.

Really? How does the Post know that this “fear” is driving the donors? Is anyone who wrote this story — Josh Dawsey, Jeff Stein, Michael Scherer, or Elizabeth Dwoskin — a mind reader? Did any of them interview the Trump donors and obtain a confession that their contributions are motivated by greed?

Presumably not, because here’s how the Post ends up trying to support its baseless and rather scurrilous claim:

Democrats argue that these billionaires are making their personal fortunes their top priority. Biden has promised to raise many taxes on the rich, including the capital gains rate paid on investment income, and impose a new 25 percent tax specifically on billionaires. These efforts were stymied in his first administration, but the president would try again.

“The billionaire class is really threatened by Biden: These guys are about creating a dynasty of wealth for themselves, and hoarding it for their posterity, at the expense of everyone else in society,” said Steve Rosenthal, senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan think tank. “That’s the striking story at the moment.”

So the Post has adopted, and is parroting, the talking point of “Democrats” and some anti-tax cut guy at a “nonpartisan think” tank. I doubt that any of these sources is a mind reader either.

At the end of its long story, the Post quotes Steve Moore, a conservative who has advised Trump on economic matters. Moore says that talk by Biden of an increase in the capital gains and corporate tax rates has Wall Street concerned.

Republicans have always opposed such increases as bad policy and maybe for personal reasons, as well. But the notion that these increases would “drastically reduce” anyone’s “fortune” or prevent anyone from passing it on to “their posterity” is laughable.

The Post does allow for the possibility of a more innocent explanation for the Trump donations:

In some cases, [the willingness to contribute to Trump] also points to [the donors’] discomfort with the Biden administration’s foreign and domestic policy decisions.

(Emphasis added)

Yes, there is that. There’s Biden’s calamitous Afghanistan withdrawal, his profligate spending, his “catch-and-release” or “don’t-catch-at-all” border policy, his appeasement of the far left on cultural issues, and our so-so economy. It’s big of the Post to acknowledge that “some” Trump donors have noticed these things and are sufficiently unhappy about them to back the former president financially.

But why does the Post say, “in some cases”? Does the Post know which contributors are uncomfortable with, and motivated by, Biden’s policy decision and which are motivated by pure greed?

One can imagine the four Post authors and perhaps an editor arguing over whether to admit that the Trump contributors actually care about policy, and compromising by saying “some” do. (And by the way, why does it take four reporters to put together a weak and thinly sourced story like this one.)

The Post also suggests a third explanation for the recent willingness of rich Republicans to donate to Trump:

“If it starts to look like Trump may win, despite his legal troubles, it is inevitable that Republican businesspeople who have not been fans will open their wallets in self-defense,” said Kathryn Wylde, CEO of the Partnership for New York City, the top lobbying group for major corporations in New York.

This, for sure, is a plausible motive. The desire to back a winner will always impel some to donate to a candidate with a good shot at becoming president. This is true of both Democrat and Republican donors.

So there are two plausible motives here — the desire to avoid a second Biden term and the desire to back a winner.

By contrast, the motive the Post asserts (without evidence) — the desire of billionaires to protect their fortunes — seems implausible. Increasing the capital gains tax won’t cut meaningfully into their fortunes. Neither will increasing taxes on corporations.

A 25 percent tax on all wealth over $100 million would significantly raise the tax burden of some billionaires (though it wouldn’t cause them to stop being billionaires). But the likelihood that Biden could impose such a tax is small.

To get this increase in a second Biden term the following would have to occur: (1) Democrats would have to control the House, (2) Democrats would have to control the Senate, (3) Senate Democrats would have to get rid of the filibuster, and (4) because the margins associated with (1) and (2) would almost certainly be tight, nearly all Democrats in both chambers would have to support the 25 percent tax.

I doubt that billionaires are quaking in their boots. Nor does the Post present any evidence (other than left-liberal talking points) that they are.

In the end, all the Post shows is that some wealthy members of the donor class who supported other Republican candidates in the primaries and who, in some cases, denounced Trump after January 6, 2021, are now swallowing hard and giving him money.

But it’s normal for donors who backed losing candidates in primaries to rally around the winning candidate in the general election. Joe Biden profited from this phenomenon in 2020.

As for the post-January 6 denunciations, including the statement by one donor that he regretted voting for Trump, they preceded the Biden presidency. It’s not surprising that conservative donors who have witnessed that presidency are disgusted by it, believe the Trump presidency was much better, and, therefore, are doing what they normally do — back the Republican presidential candidate financially.

Indeed, many conservatives will conclude that, considering the alternative, backing Trump is their duty. Obviously, the Post disagrees.

But disagreeing with the Post about what’s good for America isn’t evidence of greed. It’s just evidence of conservatism.