Loans to Kushner’s family firm under probe
WASHINGTON: White House officials have been looking into whether US$500mil (RM1.95bil) 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 Rep Raja Krishnamoorthi that the White House Counsel’s office told him that officials were probing the loans to Kushner Cos and whether “additional procedures are necessary to avoid violations in the future”.
Krishnamoorthi, an Illinois Democrat, had asked Apol on March 1 about a New York Times report in February that Kushner Cos accepted US$184mil (RM717mil) in loans from Apollo Global Management and US$325mil (RM1.26bil) from Citigroup last year over a span of several months after Kushner met with officials from the two firms.
As President Donald Trump’s sonin-law and key adviser, Kushner plays an influential role in domestic and foreign policy decisions.
Late on Monday, Kushner’s attorney Abbe Lowell said that “the White House counsel concluded there were no issues involving Jared”.
Several White House officials contacted for comment were not immediately available to confirm whether White House lawyers had completed the inquiry.
Lowell denied any improprieties by Kushner, saying “he was not involved with his former company after he entered government service; the transactions in question came after that; he had nothing to do with those transactions; the transactions had nothing to do with any of his meetings in the White House”.
Both companies have insisted their officials did nothing wrong in meeting with Kushner.
In one case cited by the Times, Citigroup lent US$325mil to Kushner Cos in spring 2017 shortly after Kushner met with Citi’s chief executive, Michael Corbat.
Last week, Citigroup’s general counsel told several Democratic lawmakers in a letter that the loan was “completely appropriate”.
In a second case, Kushner met several times with Apollo co-founder Joshua Harris and discussed a possible White House job – followed by Apollo’s loan of US$184mil to the Kushner family firm.
An Apollo spokesman previously said that Harris “never discussed with Jared Kushner a loan, investment, or any other business arrangement or regulatory matter involving Apollo”.
In a separate letter last week to Democratic lawmakers, an Apollo official added that “to our knowledge, Jared Kushner did not play any role on behalf of Kushner Companies with respect” to the loan.