All posts tagged "jared kushner"

'Explain!' Shocked critics demand to know why Cory Booker confirmed Jared Kushner's dad

Democrats are demanding to hear from Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), who defied his party to become the only Democrat voting to confirm Charles Kushner as ambassador to France.

Booker joined 50 Republicans to confirm Kushner, with 45 Democrats voting "no."

Kushner is the father of Ivanka Trump's husband, Jared Kushner. The family patriarch was sentenced in 2005 to "two years in prison after pleading guilty to 16 counts of tax fraud, witness retaliation, and making false statements to the Federal Election Commission."

The New Jersey Globe noted that Booker and Charles Kushner have a "long-standing relationship" that saw Kushner donate to Booker's unsuccessful Newark mayoral bid in 2002. He went on to become mayor in 2006.

On Bluesky, attorney @bigesqbae.bsky.social‬ posted to her 23K followers, "So why did Cory Booker vote yes to confirm Charles Kushner to be US AMBASSADOR to France??? @booker.senate.gov EXPLAIN PLEASE."

Commentator Molly Ploofkins wrote, "Cory Booker should spend 24 hours on the Senate floor explaining why he voted to confirm a convicted felon as the U.S. ambassador to France."

EXCLUSIVE: Trump accused of new grift that puts Qatari plane in shade

Journalist David Atkins wrote, "I do not understand what possible benefit Cory Booker derives from voting to confirm Charles Kushner. Why???? What is the motivation here?"

Liberal commentator @lebergerdavid.bsky.social‬ wrote, "Cory Booker voted to confirm NJ convicted felon Charles Kushner, the father of Jared Kushner, who was sentenced to prison for tax evasion, illegal campaign contributions and witness tampering to be our ambassador to France. WTF? I really don’t get this."

Others asked what the point was of Booker's all-night filibuster on the Senate floor last month, in protest of the Trump administration.

"Imagine doing a 24 hour filibuster to 'Save Democracy' and then being the only Democrat voting for the financial criminal Kushner bc he raised you a bunch of cash Booker is such a fraud. He's even worse than the openly corrupt because he pretends to be some kind of better angel," wrote political strategist Conor Rogers.

Gabrielle A. Perry, founder of a Louisiana-based nonprofit, wrote, "Cory Booker is riding that sh---- speech as cover for cozying up the fascists."

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, whose bio described her as a theoretical physicist and Black feminist theorist, compared Booker with the recent ICE protest of Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-NJ).

"Like LaMonica McIver is being charged for protesting an ICE facility and Cory Booker is supporting the ambitions of the Kushner family."

Fellow Democrat, Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) explained her "no" vote.

"Charles Kushner was convicted of making false statements to the FEC and pleaded guilty to tax evasion & witness tampering. And Trump pardoned him. Of course, I voted NO to advance Kushner’s nomination as AMBASSADOR TO FRANCE. We don't need any more Kushners in government."

‪@aniceburrito.bsky.social‬

26K

Cory Booker voted to confirm a convicted tax cheat & sextortionist

Cory Booker is yet another reminder that no one will save us or this country. We must save ourselves and the country. Resist. Act. Protest.

‪@benusa.bsky.social‬

Former Trump donor lobs corruption allegations at Jared and Ivanka's planned luxury resort

A one-time donor to former President Donald Trump is publicly lobbing allegations of corruption at daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner.

The New York Times has written a lengthy Wednesday report about a proposed luxury resort being pitched by Kushner and Ivanka Trump in Albania that has already been raising eyebrows in terms of potential conflicts of interest.

Evi Kokalari-Angelakis, who donated thousands of dollars to boost Trump's reelection bid in 2020, tells the Times that she believes the Romanian government has refused to even consider her proposal for luxury resort development on a particular island on the Mediterranean Sea because Trump and Kushner are interested in developing on the same location.

Specifically, she believes that Trump and Kushner have been receiving special favors from the government of Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama as a way to curry favor with the former president should he be reelected this year.

“The U.S. would have a hard time taking action against Rama’s government while he is in partnership with Jared and Ivanka,” she told the Times.

ALSO READ: Ohio's Republican Sec. of State changes voting rules right before 2024 election

A spokesperson for Rama denied this claim and called her accusations "quite amusing" given that Rama leads Albania's Socialist Party and is not someone who is naturally allied with someone such as Trump.

All the same, Argon Shehaj, a leader of the opposition party, is also raising suspicions about the development project.

“Of course for Albania, which is a poor country, it is important to develop tourism,” Shehaj told the Times. “But there has been a lack of transparency here, and it makes it look like this is a private deal that is in the political interest of the prime minister of Albania.”

Republicans play dumb over Jared Kushner while decrying Bob Menendez corruption

MILWAUKEE — Senate Republicans gathered at the Republican National Convention are predictably pressuring Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) to resign his office after a federal jury found him guilty on 16 counts, including accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes and acting as a foreign agent.

But those same Senate Republicans shrug off concerns about Jared Kushner — President Donald Trump's son-in-law and a former senior adviser — who many Democrats accuse of corruption involving his private equity firm, Affinity Partners, and its $2 billion business deal with the Saudi crown prince.

Kushner, unlike Menendez, has not been criminally charged and maintains he’s done nothing wrong.

“I agree with [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer that Menendez should resign,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) told Raw Story from the Fiserv Forum, where the Republican National Convention is being conducted. “And I’ve stayed quiet on this case up until this point, but now that the jury has returned a verdict — a jury of his peers have found him guilty of blatant bribery. The facts are appalling and I think Chuck Schumer is right that it’s time for him to resign.”

ALSO READ: Associated Press issues warning about iconic Trump assassination attempt photo

“Some people say that Kushner’s corrupt too — with his $2 billion Saudi fund — what do you make of that?” Raw Story pressed.

Cruz’s face soured before he turned around and was swept away by his entourage, including three big, elbow throwing security guards.

Menendez has “gotta leave,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) told Raw Story after addressing delegates at the Republican National Convention Tuesday.

Former lawmakers using 'slush funds' to lobby members of Congress for foreign nations U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, seen here in 2015. (AFP)

“Do you think the Senate should vote on booting him?” Raw Story asked.

“The best thing for him is to go ahead and leave,” Scott said.

“When it comes to corruption, do you remember the charges against Jared Kushner getting $2 billion from the Saudis for his fund?” Raw Story asked. “What do you make of those charges?”

“I don’t know much about it,” Scott said. “No, you know, it’s my understanding that for a lot of people these sovereign funds invest in a lot of different things. I don’t know enough about it.”

On the convention floor, the cheerful, celebratory mood of Republicans changed whenever Menedez was mentioned.

“At this point he’s a convicted felon,” Sen. John Boozman (R-AR) told Raw Story. “My message has been, let’s wait and see what happens, which I think is perfectly right. And now that he’s been convicted, I think he should go.”

For senators, the Menendez matter is personal. When one senator is found with gold bars and a free Mercedes-Benz, voters might suspect that other senators in the “world’s greatest deliberative body” are on the take, too.

Menendez has “gotten himself in this position. It’s sad for him and his family. It’s also sad for the institution,” Boozman said. “And that reflects on all of us and, so many people, that’s the view that they have of us. One of the big problems of governing this country is that Americans have lost faith in their institutions, and so this is just another blow to that.”

“What do you think, cause when it comes to corruption, some people point to Jared Kushner and that family thing — the $2 billion from the Saudis?” Raw Story pressed.

“I don’t know anything about that,” Boozman said. “I think just apples and oranges.”

Meanwhile, the matter of Trump’s own legal issues — particularly a Manhattan jury finding him guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in service of keeping former porn actress Stormy Daniels quiet about a sexual affair before the 2016 election — are almost never mentioned here in Milwaukee.

Trump is scheduled to be sentenced in September. Far from asking Trump to step down from the Republican ticket, almost all Republican leaders have decried the Trump verdict as a miscarriage of justice and maintain Trump is innocent, particularly in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity.

Kushner's $2B Saudi deal slammed as 'egregious' and an 'apparent payoff' as probe launched

A former head ethics counsel for the Treasury Department said it's "long overdue" for an investigation into Jared Kushner, former senior advisor to President Donald Trump known for his significant influence in the Trump administration and his work in the Middle East.

News broke Wednesday that the Senate Finance Committee launched an investigation into Kushner's overseas business activities. Committee Chair Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) asked Kushner's firm Affinity Partners for details about a $2 billion investment from the Saudi Arabian government’s Public Investment Fund in 2021 and funding from other foreign investors.

“The Saudi PIF’s decision to invest $2 billion in Affinity so soon after Kushner’s departure from the Trump White House raises concerns that the investment was a reward for official actions Kushner took to benefit the Saudi government," Wyden wrote, "including preventing accountability for the Saudi government ordering the brutal murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi."

ALSO READ: Inside the 'irregular warfare' campaign fascists are conducting against America

In light of Wyden's letter, former Treasury Department ethics counsel head Virginia Canter told Salon on Wednesday that the probe is “vital for our national security," adding that it's "pretty apparent" Kushner was involved in decisions that were "unusually favorable to the Saudis," and that within weeks of departing the White House, that he negotiated a $2 billion investment deal with them.

"It just raises all kinds of national security concerns for a former government official at that level – a former White House official — who never qualified, legitimately, for a security clearance," Canter said, adding that his actions while in the White House appeared to be swayed by his future once he left. “It’s one of the most egregious situations I’ve ever seen in decades of working in the federal government as an ethics official,” Canter said. “It appears to be a payoff as much as a potential investment."

A panel that screens investments for Saudi Arabia's Sovereign Wealth Fund warned against investing with the inexperienced Kushner. The full board, led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, overruled the recommendation.

Wyden has asked Kushner's firm for details about its investments, any fees it has received and how much Kushner has been paid.

Trump may tap son-in-law Jared Kushner for Secretary of State in a second term: report

Former President Donald Trump could tap his son-in-law Jared Kushner as Secretary of State if he wins another term, reported Vanity Fair on Wednesday.

"According to two sources, prominent Republicans are speculating that Kushner is in the running to take charge at Foggy Bottom if Trump wins in November," reported Gabriel Sherman. "One source briefed on the conversations said Republican senators have privately asked Kushner to head up the agency." Sources also said that Kushner, who walked away from politics to work in investment, will take until late summer to make his decision.

Kushner served in a White House advisory role in the previous Trump term. While he was not formally a diplomat, Trump frequently tapped him for foreign policy projects, and he was involved in the negotiation of deals between Israel and Arab states known as the Abraham Accords.

ALSO READ: Deadline demolished: Illinois congressman violates federal financial disclosure law

"If Trump were to nominate Kushner to be his secretary of state, it would present risks and opportunities for the administration, not to mention the country," said the report. "Kushner’s financial relationships in the Middle East — especially with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, which committed $2 billion to his private equity firm — would raise a host of ethical issues and surely be probed by Congress during a confirmation hearing. At the same time, many senators might prefer Kushner to MAGA hard-liners like General Mike Flynn or Richard Grenell, who could stoke Trump’s impulses to blow up America’s long-standing alliances like NATO. 'It would show Trump is not purely on a revenge tour,' one of the sources said."

Kushner's investment deals with foreign countries have often raised red flags from political observers as a potential point of corruption.

The former president's plans for a second term generally have triggered alarms, particularly his pledges to be a "dictator on day one" on certain policy issues and his allies' plans to strip independence from the civil service.

Trump biographer says 'easy mark' Jared Kushner is a Saudi pawn

Trump biographer Tim O'Brien agreed with calls from Democratic leaders to investigate former President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner's financial relationship with the government of Saudi Arabia, on Friday's edition of MSNBC's "Deadline: White House."

"The ex-president does such a volume business of scandal that I feel like it was sometimes hard for the press and Democrats and ethical people to look in any one place for long," said anchor Nicolle Wallace. "But Jared Kushner was doing what Jared Kushner was doing the whole time. Are you surprised that it didn't get attention before this?"

"Well, I do think — I think we talked about it a couple years ago, Nicolle, about Kushner and the Saudi investment," said O'Brien. "I think the issue with Jared Kushner is that he is so ignorant and unschooled that people to some degree expected him to be harmless. He was in a White House making policy, particularly foreign policy, and I think he had his own eyes set on what he would do when he left the White House. Jared Kushner, his professional life and most of his life overall, was helped along by his father's wealth. He has never really achieved very much on his own."

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to run for office?

"When people invest a billion dollars, like they did with Steve Mnuchin, or $2 billion, with Jared Kushner, they expect to see a return on their money," O'Brien continued. "Jared Kushner is not somebody any well-heedled savvy investor will give that kind of money to unless they think there are other things to be gained from outside of investment return. They already knew from his time in the White House, that the Trump White House had overridden Congress' opposition to a Saudi arms deal. The Trump White House soft-pedaled pressing the Saudis on Jamal Khashoggi's murder. So there were clearly possible quid pro quos while he was in the White House."

"After leaving the White House, he gets this windfall of investment money, I think, because the Saudis were placing their bets on the possibility that Donald Trump might come into the White House again and they would have an easy mark in Jared Kushner," said O'Brien. "I think there is a money trail that can be followed there as you've asked. There's possibly a communications trail. I think it should cloud anything Kushner does for the campaign, Trump's campaign. The possibility that Jared Kushner will be in the White House again. This has to weigh heavily on that. It is a deep national security problem on top of being an ethical quagmire."

Ultimately, O'Brien added, "It is more than passing strange that the GOP is intent on tarring Hunter Biden with some of these allegations, when the proof, or at least the evidence of stuff that's much more problematic with Jared Kushner hasn't been equally probed."

Watch the video below or at the link here.

Tim O'Brien says Jared Kushner is a Saudi pawnwww.youtube.com

Jared Kushner's income sources shock economic analyst: 'Never seen this'

A recent analysis showed that only 1% of investments in Jared Kushner's private equity firm came from sources in the United States, reportedly stunning an economic analyst viewing the data.

Trump's son-in-law purportedly took in $2 billion from the Saudis, prompting Steven Rattner to say he's never seen anything like it, according to Salon's report.

"Economic analyst Steven Rattner on Monday shared a pie chart showing that all but 1% of the $3 billion in investments in former President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner's private equity firm Affinity Partners came from foreign sources after he 'spent much of his White House tenure cozying up' to Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman," the outlet reported. "The Saudis invested $2 billion in Kushner's fund while the United Arab Emirates and Qatar each added another $200 million. About $625 million came from other non-U.S. sources while only $31 million came from sources inside the U.S. Rattner told MSNBC that he's 'never seen this' in 40 years in the business."

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to run for office?

Rattner reportedly added:

"I've never seen somebody get two-thirds of their money from a single investor. Usually a single investor might be a few percent of the fund, might be 5 percent, occasionally 10 percent."

The report noted that Rattner said that Kushner has hired some people for his fund, but, "I've seen nothing else about what he's actually done with the money."

He reportedly continued:

"It is normal to invest this money over a period of several years, so I don't think we can draw a firm conclusion yet. But, again, we're going back to a guy who's a real estate guy, and frankly, not a particularly good one at that, who's suddenly got $3 billion trying to do private equity deals competing against people who've been in this business for a long time. And I wouldn't, if I were the Saudis, count on making a lot of money from this any time soon."

Read it here.

'This is a huge scandal': Ex-senator slams Congress for ignoring Jared Kushner's corruption

As House Republicans, led by Rep. James Comer (R-KY), fixate and obsess on their investigation of Hunter Biden and their effort to probe President Joe Biden somehow accepted bribes through his son's business activity — a probe that is going nowhere and which they admit is a political stunt — former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) highlighted on MSNBC that former President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner is transparently involved in far more serious corrupt dealings than anything the GOP has even accused the Biden family of doing.

"What drives me crazy about this is the blinking red light around Jared Kushner," said McCaskill, who worked as a prosecutor before going to Congress. "Why does the Senate not start hearings?"

"Let's just briefly walk through what Jared Kushner did," said McCaskill. "He was put in to run a huge portfolio in a government where he had no experience. Running foreign policy in the Middle East peace process. He has no experience. What does he do? First, he becomes best buddies with the crown prince of Saudi Arabia. He gets Trump to go to Saudi Arabia for his first trip. Has the crown prince in the White House dining room. He does all that, and what happens the minute Trump leaves office? He starts, for the first time, a private equity fund. He goes over and asks the crown prince for two billion dollars. And you know what the committee said that runs the sovereign wealth fund for Saudi Arabia? ... They said, this is a really bad idea. They did their due diligence and failed miserably in every test of due diligence. And management fees were excessive. They recommended against making a two billion dollar investment. Of course, the crown prince came along and overruled him, and gave Jared Kushner two billion dollars."

By contrast, McCaskill noted, former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin similarly pressed the Saudi government, through his Trump connections, to try to get an investment in his firm, and got half as much money with far lower management fees. "This is a huge scandal," she said. "I do not understand why the Senate is not doing a hearing on all of the Trump grift. And I'm not even talking about the money they netted off foreign governments while they were in office."

IN OTHER NEWS: U.S. Army reservist ran a ‘white nationalist’ training camp and touted KKK ties

Democrats' failure to properly investigate Kushner in the Senate, warned McCaskill, is "a good way to make every headline about Hunter Biden and make everyone forget about what the Trump family did: massive grift while they were in office and even bigger grift trading off the influence of the name Trump after they got out of office. I really think that what Hunter Biden did — I disagree what he did, I don't know if his father disagreed what he did. I know that he was tormented by the death of his other son and the addiction of Hunter. But I do know this. I know that the more we give them an open playing field to try to pretend like Joe Biden did something wrong because of Hunter, the bigger mistake we make."

"We need to explain to the American people, first, that Joe Biden did nothing wrong, we have no evidence he did anything wrong, and secondly, don't look over here, look at the real sleaziness that occupied the White House the last time Republicans were in charge," said McCaskill.

Watch the video below or at the link.

Claire McCaskill on Jared Kushner vs. Hunter Bidenwww.youtube.com

'Gonna end this family grift': Christie hits Trump over Kushner-Saudi relationship

Former New Jersey governor and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie railed against thrice-indicted ex-President Donald Trump for employing members of his family at the White House and suggested that there was a corrupt motive for Trump having then-Oval Office strategist Jared Kushner represent the United States government to other countries.

"Why would you send Jared Kushner to the Middle East when you have Rex Tillerson and Mike Pompeo as secretary of state? Two incredibly accomplished men. You send him why? We found out the answer six months after he left office. $2 billion from the Saudis to Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. $2 billion," Christie told an audience of his GOP primary supporters. "And because he did all this and more, he's normalizing this conduct and now we have another president who's doing exactly the same thing and allowing Hunter Biden to run roughshod making money from foreign governments and selling access to Joe Biden."

Republicans in the House of Representatives, despite conducting a months-long investigation into Hunter Biden's alleged influence peddling, have admittedly not produced direct evidence that President Joe Biden personally profited or that his policies have been extensions of his son's business relationships.

Nonetheless, Christie pledged that if elected he would forbid his relatives from invoking his role as commander-in-chief to boost their professional profiles.

"I got asked today by some reporter, 'What would you do to make sure that didn't happen?' The easy answer would be, don't let my family anywhere near the White House after I win," Christie said. "But that's not what I would do because I'm a leader and my family respects me and I respect them. And I'd look everyone in the eye and say, 'Nobody gets a job in this government and nobody makes any money off of what I'm doing for the American people.' That will be the rule of my administration. I'm gonna end this family grift that's going on."

Christie added that "We are not a third-world republic. We are the United States of America, and it's time for Donald Trump's family to get off the public doll and go back to New York where they belong."

Watch below via the Republican Accountability Project or at this link.

Jared Kushner and Hope Hicks key to zeroing in on Trump's intent: ex-prosecutor

Two of Donald Trump's longtime top aides — his son-in-law Jared Kushner, and political adviser Hope Hicks, were interviewed by special counsel Jack Smith as part of the criminal investigation into the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. According to reports, Kushner told Smith that Trump genuinely believed the election had been stolen from him.

These interviews are massively important to establish the former president's intent, argued former federal prosecutor Jennifer Rodgers on CNN Thursday.

"How much of a window can prosecutors get on Trump's intent — key word, intent — on his in-laws like Jared Kushner, his son-in-law?" asked Wolf.

"They can get a lot," said Rodgers. "Also Hope Hicks. These are two of the people who were around him most in those days following the election and leading up to January 6th."

"There were others as well, Mark Meadows and others," Rodgers continued, "But these are two people who were often in the room, and so as Trump and his allies were discussing what to do now about the election, the fact that he lost, how they're going to move forward with the court cases and the other steps they ended up taking, they would be two of the people there listening to the back and forth. Really critical evidence about what the former president knew when they were making all of those plans."

All of this comes amid the backdrop of the federal case Smith brought against Trump, involving the alleged theft of classified documents, continuing to move ahead, with a back and forth between prosecutors and defense about when to hold the trial.

Watch below or click here.

Jennifer Rodgers says prosecutors can get "a lot" from Jared Kushner and Hope Hickswww.youtube.com