Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Documents: Trump still benefits from business
and the presidency, he retains ownership of the business and will personally benefit if the business profits from decisions made by his government.
Further, the business will be run by family members who remain the most trusted members of Trump’s inner circle, raising questions about whether Trump’s promises to limit communication about the business’ fate are realistic.
“What I’m going to be doing is my two sons, who are right here, Don and Eric, are going to be running the company,” Trump had said at a news conference shortly before taking office. “They’re not going to discuss it with me.”
Less than two weeks after returning to their New York City home following their father’s inauguration, Donald Trump Jr. and his brother Eric Trump, also assigned to run the business, were back in Washington last week to attend the announcement of Trump’s nominee to the Supreme Court.
Trump Organization representatives did not respond for comment about the documents Saturday.
The trust document obtained by ProPublica is attached to license filings tied to Trump’s Washington hotel, and it remains unclear whether other Trump businesses are governed under the same trust. The company has declined multiple requests to provide trust agreements that could provide more clarity.
In recent weeks, corporate filings have documented that the Trump Organization has been removing the president as an officer or director of the more than 400 entities registered across the country associated with the organization.
The Trump Organization also provided a list, signed by Trump the day before his inauguration, of more than 400 companies from which he had agreed to resign. Other companies have been dissolved in recent months, the company said.
Those resignations provide evidence the president no longer has official management responsibilities in the businesses, as he and his attorney pledged during a news conference last month. Still, Trump will continue to profit from their success.
The company has also named attorney Bobby Burchfield to serve as an outside ethics adviser, indicating that some corporate transactions will require his sign-off.