A tower of trouble for Trump
The US President’s dream of a landmark building in Moscow led to his former lawyer lying to Congress, writes Stephen Braun
Donald Trump for decades dreamed of building a Trump Tower in the heart of Moscow, a plan that flared and fizzled several times over the years, most recently when his presidential campaign was gaining momentum.
That last plan led Trump’s longtime lawyer Michael Cohen to plead guilty yesterday to a charge brought by the special prosecutor looking into possible Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Cohen admitted he lied to Congress about key details in the negotiations for the Moscow tower, most notably that those talks stretched much deeper into the presidential campaign than previously thought, to June of 2016.
Trump, speaking to reporters yesterday, disputed Cohen’s timeline and suggested his former fixer was telling prosecutors what they wanted to hear to save his own skin. As for why the most recent deal failed, Trump said he made the decision himself for one main reason.
“It was very simple,” he said. “I was very focused on running for President.”
Trump’s plans for a Trump Tower in Moscow went back as far as 1996 when the future President paid a visit to the Russian capital to check out building sites on land being developed by a US company.
That idea fell through, along with plans to revamp the dilapidated Hotel Moskva next to the Kremlin, but the real estate mogul raised the prospect of a “super-luxury residential tower” bearing his name on other sites he visited on his three-day stay in the city.
“Moscow is going to be huge,” Trump told Playboy magazine in a 1997 interview.
Trump revived the idea in 2013 during his visit to Moscow as owner of the Miss Universe pageant. Trump later said he had discussed the idea with Aras and Emin Agalarov, a fatherand-son Russian development team close to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump reportedly scouted a potential site, but the idea again faded.
The tower idea came back yet again in October 2015, when Andrey Rozov, an obscure Russian real estate developer, signed a letter of intent sent by Cohen to advance the construction of a Trump World Tower
that would feature 250 luxury condos, no fewer than 15 floors of hotel rooms, commercial and office space, a fitness centre and an Ivanka Trump spa.
It was a potentially lucrative deal for Trump’s company, handing it US$4 million ($5.83m) in upfront fees plus possibly millions more from a cut on everything from food and banquet fees to spa charges. His share on the first US$100 million in condo sales alone would reach another $5 million.
Rozov’s signed letter was sent back to Cohen by Felix Sater, another Trump world figure who had worked on and off for the Trump Organisation and operated as a government
informant following a 1998 conviction in a stock fraud case.
Sater sent Cohen an email expressing optimism: “Let’s make this happen and build a Trump Moscow. And possibly fix relations between the countries by showing everyone that commerce and business are much better and more practical than politics.”
Donald Trump jnr and Ivanka Trump were copied in on emails about the project in late 2015, according to a person close to the Trump Organisation. In one email, Ivanka Trump even suggested an architect for the building, the person said, noting the Trump Organisation
provided the emails to congressional committees. The company’s email traffic about the project ends in January 2016, said the person, who wasn’t authorised to speak publicly about the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Like the previous failed projects, the Rozovhelmed effort soon ran aground. According to Cohen’s testimony last year and his plea agreement, negotiations with Rozov’s group stalled, and the two Trump associates turned to aides to Russian President Vladimir Putin to move the project forward. Cohen told congressional investigators last year that he had sent an email in January 2016 to Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s spokesman. Cohen told the committee he never heard back from Peskov and the tower deal collapsed by the end of that month. But according to Cohen’s new statement to prosecutors, the tower deal remained viable as late as June
2016, after Trump had vanquished his Republican presidential rivals and was mounting his general election campaign against Hillary Clinton. Cohen said he kept Trump, named as “Individual 1” in the plea, updated about the deal’s progress, and also “briefed family members of Individual 1 within the company about the project”. Cohen said in his plea that he also spoke by phone with an assistant to Peskov — identified in the plea as “Russian Official 1” — in January 2016 and outlined the project and “requested assistance in moving the project forward”. According to the plea, Cohen later discussed travelling to Moscow to jump-start the deal. In May 2016, a month after Trump had emerged the winner of the GOP primaries, Sater — identified as “Individual 2” — told Cohen that Peskov wanted to meet him in mid-June at an international business forum in St Petersburg and “possibly introduce you” to Putin or Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. Sater and Cohen continued to email about the foundering project well into June
2016, soon after a muchscrutinised meeting at Trump Tower in New York between Trump’s son Don jnr, son-in-law Jared Kushner, campaign chairman Paul Manafort and several Russians, purportedly to discuss the possibility of “dirt” on Hillary Clinton. On June 14, Cohen met Sater in the tower lobby and told him his potential trip to St Petersburg was off. Yesterday, Trump said his consideration of a Moscow tower was all part of being a businessman who was also running for President. “I decided ultimately not to do it,” he said. “There would be nothing wrong if I did do it.” He added: “There was a good chance that I wouldn’t have won, in which case I would have gone back into the business, and why should I lose lots of opportunities?”
The US-China trade war, the Saudi crown prince’s first trip abroad since the brutal killing of a newspaper columnist and the Ukraine crisis will grab the world’s attention at this weekend’s G-20 summit.
None of those issues is on the agenda at the two-day meeting that was meant to focus on development, infrastructure and food security.
But the gathering of leaders from the world’s top industrialised and emerging nations that opened today will be eclipsed by discussions and controversy on the sidelines.
“The G-20 summit features high drama on the turbulent global stage, with US President Donald Trump, China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin playing leading roles,” said Michael Shifter, head of the InterAmerican Dialogue, a Washingtonbased thinktank.
Here’s a look at what to watch for during the summit:
US-China trade war
The global economy is at stake when Trump and Xi meet at a high-stakes dinner in Buenos Aires tomorrow. Can they reach a truce on a dispute that has rattled markets? Trump promises to impose new tariffs on imports from China if they don’t.
Most analysts doubt they will reach any overarching deal this weekend that would settle the conflict for good.
But if the two sides agree to a ceasefire, it could buy time for more substantive talks.
“Whether they shake hands and announce some kind of agreement, or whether they don’t, we don’t think that anything substantial is going to happen in the broader US-China trade conflict,” said Willis Sparks, director of global macro politics at Eurasia Group.
“It involves a lot more complex issues that are not going to be resolved over the course of a single dinner.”
Prince or pariah?
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is at the summit following the gruesome slaying of columnist Jamal Khashoggi and allegations that he ordered the killing inside the country’s consulate in Turkey’s capital last month.
Trump has given the prince a pass while citing exaggerated claims of Saudi military contracts and investments in the US, and Putin has not criticised Saudi Arabia or the prince. But European and other leaders are likely to try to avoid a photo-op that could cause backlash at home by appearing to legitimise the man who US intelligence agencies concluded ordered the killing.
Human Rights Watch has accused the crown prince of war crimes in Yemen and responsibility for Khashoggi’s killing, and Argentine legal authorities are considering a request to prosecute bin Salman for alleged crimes against humanity.
“A cloud of suspicion will loom over him as he tries to rebuild his shattered reputation at the G-20, and world leaders would do well to think twice before posing for pictures next to someone who may come under investigation for war crimes and torture,” Human Rights Watch said.
Ukraine
Trump cancelled a meeting with Putin at the summit, citing Russia’s recent seizure of Ukrainian naval vessels and crews. Russia has said Ukraine didn’t have permission to pass between Russia’s mainland and the Crimean Peninsula, while Ukraine insists its vessels abided by maritime laws. Analysts say the question will be how much pressure will Trump and the EU put on Putin over the issue.
US-Europe relations
Europe is on weak footing at this year’s G-20. France fears Trump will block or eclipse any progress at the summit, and President Emmanuel Macron’s main task will be making sure Europe’s voice is heard and doesn’t get diluted by internal divisions.
Trump recently lit into Macron over his suggestion that Europe build up its militaries because the continent can no longer depend on the US. Trump also criticised him over French tariffs on US wine and even Macron’s approval ratings.
Trump also said British Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit agreement “sounds like a great deal for the EU” that would make it more difficult for the UK to strike a trade deal with the US. The British pound fell in the wake of his comments, which were countered by May.
“The Europeans know that they need to get along for the greater good of the trade relations. But the relations between Trump and the European leaders that he’s going to see in Buenos Aires are really bad,” Sparks said.
“The word that comes along to me when it comes to the relation between these leaders is: Icy.” Nafta Mexico and Canada recently reached agreement with the Trump Administration on a revamped version of the North American
Free Trade
Agreement, and the deal is expected to be signed during the G-20 summit, though it won’t take effect until approved by the countries’ legislatures.
“Maybe the one bright spot [at the summit] is the signing of the new Nafta,” said Shannon O’Neil, an expert on global trade at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The renegotiations, however, left a bad taste among the partners, Shifter said.
While the three leaders are supposed to be at the signing ceremony, Sparks said the possibility remains that it could be left to less senior officials because Canada and Mexico are not happy Trump did not lift tariffs on steel and aluminum.
“What was supposed to be an event that would mark a turning point,” Sparks said, “is looking like lower down on the bill.” Low expectations Even the host country of the summit has lowered expectations.
Pedro Villagra Delgado, Argentina’s lead organiser for the G-20, acknowledged last week that it might not be possible to reach a consensus on a final statement.
Patricio Navia, a political science professor at New York University, said there are “way too many ongoing conflicts” and potential sources of instability at a summit that will likely be “an echo chamber for the lack of co-ordination and co-operation” seen at other forums.
“It is unlikely that the G-20 meeting will provide any guidance as to what will happen next,” Navia said. “In fact, the meeting will probably end up generating even more instability, precisely because there will be many confusing signals coming out of the meeting.”