Donald Trump, ABC screengrab
In what has become so predictable it mainstreamed “projection,” a new investigation by Congressional Democrats revealed that during his presidency, Donald Trump’s businesses received at least $7.8 million from 20 foreign governments.
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released their 156-page report on Thursday. The report was compiled using documents from Mazars USA, Trump’s former accounting firm. The report is titled “White House for Sale: How Princes, Prime Ministers, and Premiers Paid Off President Trump.”
Trump accepted more than $7.8 million from foreign states and leaders, including “some of the world’s most unsavory regimes” (emphasis mine):
“Drawing from actual receipts and records and using the most conservative possible
accounting methodologies, White House for Sale: How Princes, Prime Ministers, and Premiers Paid Off President Trump documents how, as President, Donald Trump accepted more than $7.8 million in payments from foreign states and their leaders, including some of the world’s most unsavory regimes. By elevating his personal financial interests and the policy priorities of corrupt foreign powers over the American public interest, former President Trump violated both the clear commands of the Constitution and the careful precedent set and observed by every previous Commander-in-Chief.”
The President is FORBIDDEN from accepting money or gifts of any kind from foreign governments:
Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 of the Constitution forbids the President to accept money payments or gifts “of any kind whatever” from foreign governments and monarchs unless he obtains “the Consent of the Congress” to do so. Yet Donald Trump, while holding the office of president, used his business entities to pocket millions of dollars from foreign states and royalty and never once went to Congress to seek its consent. This report sets forth the records showing foreign government money—and all the spoils from royals we can find—pouring into hotels and buildings that the President continued to own during his presidency, all in direct violation of the
Constitutional prohibition.
This is only SOME of the payments:
“To be sure, we know about only some of the payments that passed into former President
Trump’s hands during just two years of his presidency from just 20 of the more than 190 nations in the world through just four of his more than 500 businesses. Despite the Constitution’s requirement that a president disclose foreign emoluments and seek Congress’s consent to keep them, it took Oversight Committee Democrats years of aggressive litigation against the former President to obtain the subset of documents from Mazars, Donald Trump’s accounting firm, that form the factual basis of this report.”
Republican Oversight Chair James Comer “released” Trump’s former accounting firm from having to comply with the Congressional subpoena and court-supervised settlement:
“And then, in January 2023, Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer made the abrupt and outrageous decision to release Mazars from having to continue complying with the Committee’s subpoena and court-supervised settlement agreement. Despite Chairman Comer’s decision to bury further evidence, however, even this small slice of a picture of unknown proportions allows America to glimpse the rampant illegality and corruption of the Trump presidency. It is true that $7.8 million is almost certainly only a fraction of Trump’s harvest of unlawful foreign state money, but this figure in itself is a scandal and a decisive spur to action.”
Democrats are accusing Comer of burying “further” evidence, and saying that even in spite of his doing so, they were able to put together this “small slice of a picture” of Trump’s corruption as president.
Yet Republicans accuse President Biden of the same, with no evidence
“Donald Trump’s businesses received at least $7.8 million from foreign entities while he was president. Yet Republicans in Congress will say nothing, all while accusing President Biden of the same — without evidence,” Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) wrote. “Their brand: willful blindness and hypocrisy.”
It should not be overlooked that Donald Trump is running as the law-and-order candidate, even as he faces 91 felony counts, including efforts to overthrow the election he lost and careless handling of classified information that has jeopardized the safety of American troops, agents, and here at home.
Steve Benen pointed out, “As we’ve discussed many times, the (Emoluments Clause) clause prohibits U.S. officials from receiving payments from foreign governments. Traditionally, this hasn’t been much of a problem for sitting American presidents. During the Trump era, however, it became one of the Republican’s under-appreciated controversies.”
Trump had so many scandals as president, and lit so many fires that required immediate attention, that the financial corruption took a back seat. Some of it is coming to light now, even as House Republicans use their power to bury it.
Professor of Constitutional Law Emeritus at Harvard University Laurence Tribe noted that he and his colleagues had tried to hold Trump accountable for violations of the Foreign Emoluments Clause, “Working with @CREWcrew, my colleagues and I went far toward holding Trump accountable for these grotesque violations of the Foreign Emoluments Clause — but he ran out the clock on all our efforts. That’s what he hopes to do again. Only the courts can stop him this time. Go courts.”
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