Up the grift! Trump Organization Plans an Ethics Policy Without Banning Foreign Deals

[Celerity]

The family business of President-elect Donald J. Trump is expected to announce some restrictions on transactions but is not likely to accept as many limitations as it did eight years ago.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/05/us/politics/trump-organization-ethics-policy-foreign-deals.html

https://archive.ph/NFr7e


Eric Trump, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s son, has become the de facto leader of the Trump Organization.Credit...Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times

When Eric Trump takes the stage at a cryptocurrency conference in Abu Dhabi next week, he will join a lineup of speakers celebrating “the golden age of Bitcoin.” His headlining performance will also represent a golden opportunity to signal that the Trump Organization is wide open for business. In the wake of Donald J. Trump’s election victory, his family business is poised to capitalize on his presidency with a variety of new ventures, according to a New York Times review of financial records and interviews with people knowledgeable about his finances. And unlike in his first term, the people said, the Trump Organization aims to issue a more limited ethics plan that is unlikely to significantly curb its growth.

As the inauguration approaches, Eric Trump, Mr. Trump’s second son and the company’s de facto leader, is expected to forgo deals directly with foreign governments. But he is not planning to revive the promise the company made eight years ago to swear off all other foreign deals while his father occupies the White House. Without that guardrail — the centerpiece of the Trump Organization’s 2017 ethics plan — the company would be free to profit from an array of business in countries essential to American foreign policy interests. In the months leading up to Election Day, Eric Trump struck real estate deals in Vietnam, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, and he has shown interest in new hotel projects in Israel and other countries across the Middle East, Latin America and Asia.

The Trump family is also branching out to forge foreign ties beyond the real estate business. World Liberty Financial, a new cryptocurrency platform that the Trumps helped create, recently received a lucrative investment from a Chinese entrepreneur, a deal that could ultimately pay the family about $22 million. The president-elect’s publicly traded social media company, which represents his single greatest source of wealth, is also open to foreign investment. The new ventures — both of which will face oversight from federal regulators appointed by the president — underscore how the company’s recent expansion created an even more complicated web of conflicts than in Mr. Trump’s first term. And much like the Trump administration, the Trump Organization will be unleashed in the second term, free to pursue new deals that could blur the lines between the presidency and the business.

The company’s existing properties will also continue to mix business and politics like they did in Mr. Trump’s first term, when his supporters spent lavishly at his private Florida club, Mar-a-Lago. Later this month, a Trump-aligned SuperPAC will hold a $1 million-a-plate “candlelight dinner” at Mar-a-Lago. As president, Mr. Trump is exempt from civil and criminal conflict of interest laws that would otherwise require a senior federal official to sell holdings in companies that might benefit from his or her actions. Historically, it has been up to individual presidents to voluntarily take action to avoid conflicts, like when Jimmy Carter put his peanut farm into a blind trust. Mr. Trump put his assets into a trust at the start of his first term, but his older sons remained in control of the company. And Mr. Trump still profits from family business operations.


The Trump Organization’s existing properties, like the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, will also continue to mix business and politics like they did in Mr. Trump’s first term.Credit...Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York Times

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[Redleg]

1. More like "a concept of a plan."

Ethics, we don't need no ethics. I think there is going to be a great deal of self-dealing in this mal-administration. Elon Musk is going to go hog-wild trying to benefit his own interests and screwing his competitors.