Kushner feels heat

Officials investigate loans to Trump son-in-law’s company

WHITE House officials are looking into whether $500 million in loans that went to Trump administration senior adviser Jared Kushner’s family real estate company may have spurred ethics or criminal law violations, according to the head of the federal government’s ethics agency.

David J. Apol, acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, said in a letter sent late last week to Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi that the White House Counsel’s office told him that officials were probing the loans to Kushner Companies and whether “additional procedures are necessary to avoid violations in the future”.

Mr Krishnamoorthi, an Illinois Democrat, had asked Mr Apol on March 1 about a New York Times report in February that Kushner Companies accepted $184 million in loans from Apollo Global Management and $325 million from Citigroup last year over a span of several months after Mr Kushner met with officials from the two firms.

As President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and key adviser, Mr Kushner plays an influential role in domestic and foreign policy decisions.

Both companies have insisted their officials did nothing wrong in meeting Mr Kushner. Both firms had financial interests overseen by the federal government at the time and both firms backed elements of the tax reform legislation that passed Congress last year with Mr Trump’s support.

In one case cited by the Times, Citigroup lent $325 million to Kushner Companies in spring 2017 shortly after Mr Kushner met with Citi’s chief executive, Michael Corbat.

Last week, Citigroup’s general counsel told several Democratic politicians in a letter that the loan was “completely appropriate”.

A spokeswoman for Kushner Companies said it had not received any correspondence or other notifications from the White House or OGE.