Search underway for new G-7 summit site after Trump’s reversal
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration will begin searching for a new place to hold next year’s Group of Seven summit after the president scrapped plans to hold the meeting at his Doral golf resort in Florida.
President Donald Trump reversed his plan late Saturday after facing accusations that he was using the presidency to enrich himself by hosting the international summit at the private resort owned by his family.
“I think he knows,” acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said Sunday, “people think it l ooks lousy.”
Trump said his administration “will begin the search for another site, including the possibility of Camp David, immediately.”
“Based on both Media & Democrat Crazed and Irrational Hostility, we will no longer consider Trump National Doral, Miami, as the Host Site for the G-7 in 2020,” Trump tweeted Saturday.
The reversal raises further doubts about the position of Mulvaney, the Republican president’s top aide, who held a news conference Thursday announcing the choice of Doral for the summit.
He insisted his staff had concluded it was “far and away the best physical facility.
Mulvaney said the White House reached that determination after visiting 10 sites, including spots in Hawaii, North Carolina, Tennessee and Utah. But convention, economic development and tourism officials in several of those states said they were unaware of any visits.
Mulvaney on Sunday said Trump was “honestly surprised at the level of pushback” after the Doral announcement. “At the end of the day he still considers himself to be in the hospitality business,” Mulvaney told “Fox News Sunday.”
“He wanted to put on the absolute best show, the best visit that he possibly could and he was very confident in doing that at Doral,” Mulvaney said.
Days after being the face of the selection, Mulvaney again held a national stage, but this time said: “I think it’s the right decision to change.”
Trump had been the first administration official to publicly float the selection of his property to host the summit when in August he mentioned it was on the shortlist and praised its facilities and proximity to Miami’s international airport. His comments drew criticism from good governance groups and Democrats, who said it raised concerns that Trump was using the White House to boost his personal finances
The criticism only intensified with Thursday’s announcement.
On Thursday, Mulvaney had discounted Camp David, the governmentowned presidential retreat, as the site for the summit, claiming, “I understand the folks who participated in it hated it and thought it was a miserable place to have the G-7.”