As Donald Trump began his first presidential term eight years ago, the Trump Organization issued an ethics agreement that said it would halt any new international real estate deals. That pledge is missing from the company's latest agreement, media outlets report.
The Trump family only agrees to "no new transactions with foreign governments" in its ethics pledge released Friday, The New York Times reports. Ethics lawyers told the newspaper the agreement is insufficient, pointing to the company's plan to host a golf tournament in April at its Trump National Doral resort in Miami. The event, sponsored by LIV Golf, a new league created and financed by the Saudi government, will generate hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue, per The Times.
Presidents are legally exempt from federal conflict of interest laws but are subject to a clause in the Constitution that prohibits federal officials from accepting anything of value from foreign government sources, The Times reports.
“If the president receives any profits or benefits from foreign governments — not just new deals — then he is in violation of the Constitution. The money flow has to stop on Jan. 20," Richard Painter, a former White House ethics lawyer under the George W. Bush administration, told the newspaper.
The Trump Organization backed away from numerous foreign deals after Trump won the 2016 election, CNBC reports, but Eric Trump, the company's executive vice president, recently told The Wall Street Journal he got “very little credit for it.”
The Trump Organization is planning several developments in the Middle East as a part of a global expansion, according to its website, including residential, hotel and golf projects in Oman, residential developments in Saudi Arabia and a hotel project in Dubai.
The company's ethics agreement says William A. Burck will serve as its outside lawyer, reviewing property transactions, leases, loans and any transactions with federal or state governments, per The Times. Trump will have “limited access” to the company’s financial information and receive only “general business updates” while president.
The Trump Organization will offer discounted rates to members of the U.S. Secret Service and other government agencies that use the company’s hospitality properties, CNBC reported. Trump's family was accused in his first term of overcharging the federal government after it racked up hefty Secret Service bills.
“The Trump Organization is dedicated to not just meeting but vastly exceeding its legal and ethical obligations during my father’s Presidency,” Eric Trump said in a news release.
Trump's business deals have raised questions not addressed in the ethics agreement. They include World Liberty Financial, a crypto business he and his sons launched last year with Steve Witkoff, a friend and inaugural committee co-chair who has been named special Middle East envoy. An entity affiliated with Trump, DT Marks DEFI LLC, is entitled to receive 75% of the business' revenues, according to World Liberty Financial's website. Trump has tapped Paul Atkins to lead the Securities Exchange Commission, the federal agency that regulates the crypto industry and Wall Street.
In mid-November, the Financial Times reported another potential deal. Trump Media — the parent company of Trump's social media platform, Truth Social — was in talks to buy Bakkt, a crypto trading firm previously led by Kelly Loeffler, another co-chair of his inaugural committee. Trump has since transferred all of his $4 billion stake in Trump Media, which owns Truth Social, to a revocable trust overseen by his son Donald Trump Jr. Ethics experts say the move doesn't go far enough, since the trust is not blind or independent. A spokeswoman for the president-elect has said he "didn't get into politics for profit."
Earlier this month, Trump announced that DAMAC Properties, a Dubai-based real estate firm led by billionaire Hussain Sajwani, is investing billions of dollars to help the U.S. government build data centers. DAMAC and the Trump Organization opened a Trump-branded golf course at a development in Dubai in 2017, a deal that was struck before Trump won his first term.
London-based publication Arabian Gulf Business Insight reported in December that DAMAC has secured the rights to build a Trump Tower in Abu Dhabi, citing sources familiar with the matter. Neither Damac nor the Trump Organization have confirmed or commented on the agreement.
In November, Sajwani told BloombergTV his relationship with the Trump Organization goes back over a decade and could expand further.
“We’re open to any new project, depends on the circumstance and the market,” said Sajwani.
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