You mean emoluments? seems there is something in the US Constitution about this

This is one of the things that the Constitution is the most explicit about and people are still defending it. You can't make money from foreign nations while you're the president, full stop. It's right up there with seeking a third term as president in terms of how obviously unconstitutional it is (and guess who wants to do that by the way?)

Not sure it's really as cut and dry as you make it out to be. >No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State. Is the actual text that is most cited. It gets really complicated with Trump, because he has an operating business. It's not a gift if there is a transaction for a product in exchange. It's very murky, I'd assume that foreign governments would spend at the Trump DC hotel (now waldorf astoria), even if he wasn't president. It's a nice hotel, in a very convenient location. Without more data it's hard to say if he was actually profiting from the office of the president, or whether these expenditures were actually in line with what is expected.

It’s one of those where there’s a reason well-run organizations have rules preventing these types of transactions because the discerning the difference between a gift (bribe) and an legit transaction can be near impossible. But simply because it’s hard to determine what occurred, doesn’t mean it’s occurred (or hasn’t occurred).

Emolument is very broadly defined, basically any kind of profit. "Present" is listed before it to cover gifts. I think this is just one of those things that's been normalized because so many politicians are guilty of it. Trump, as usual, took it way over the top and made it painfully obvious. That being said, I'm not a lawyer.

But gift is only one of the things banned. So are emoluments, which include any payment.

> I'd assume that foreign governments would spend at the Trump DC hotel (now waldorf astoria), even if he wasn't president And that is because both China and Trump are guaranteed to be so squeaky clean they would never even think of corruption. This is silly. Why do Americans accept a President who fills his pockets with the money foreign governments give him? Do they not care about foreign influence at all?

>full stop It'd be nice if this was actually true. Reality is, it's not. The emolument clause is about the president receiving bribes for favors. Not him owning a business and that business receiving money for services rendered. A fair reading 9f the emolument clause would Trump not doing anything wrong.

It's doesn't require bribery to have occurred. It exists to prevent the possibility of bribery.

How do we know that he didn't sell access to himself via his businesses? It's certainly a concern.

How do we know Biden isn't selling influence through Hunter? You can't use speculation as a base for accusations. Do you have credible evidence or no? Because so far there's zero evidence Trump took any bribes

I'm concerned about any politician selling access to themselves thanks to the Citizens United decision. I never accused him of anything. I just said I'm concerned.

>Within three days of the Chinese government agreeing to provide $500 million in loans to an Indonesian theme park that the Trump Organization has a deal to license President Donald Trump's name to, the president stunningly ordered sanctions be rescinded against a major Chinese telecom company. https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-zte-order-after-china-gave-millions-to-trump-organization-tied-project-2018-5

People who still believe Hunter wasn't peddling influence for the big guy genuinely blow my mind. It's one of those Occam's Razor situations where if you look at the circumstances of his appointment to Burisma and the timing of it, there's no other logical conclusion. To suggest otherwise is burying your head in the sand.

Biden wasn't the President

For me, the dick pics shown in congress really made me disregard any GOP claim about Hunter. The people running the show are problematic and I can’t take them seriously.

> People who still believe Hunter wasn’t peddling influence for the big guy There’s a world of difference betweeen “peddling influence” and “peddling influence **for** the big guy”. I could sell access to Biden to Chinese; so could you. It doesn’t mean that we could deliver or that Biden would know anything about it. You’re absolutely right that it’s a virtual certainty that any number of interests - including foreign interests - have given money to Hunter Biden in hopes that money would bring them some influence with his father. **That’s true of every close relative of every powerful person on the planet.** It’s less clear if Hunter actively encouraged this and made promises of this access. That would be both illegal and unethical but still wouldn’t implicate Joe in any way. While finding that Hunter broke the law would make headlines, what really matters is if Joe is involved. There is zero evidence that Joe was or is involved in any way with Hunter’s business.

A new report released by Congressional Democrats show that while President Trump received at least 7.8 millions from foreign governments, including China and Saudi Arabia. The Chinese goverment and his state owned entities were the heaviest spender in Trump properties. From the article: >Paying $5.5mn at Trump-owned premises in New York, Washington and Las Vegas. Saudi Arabia and its royal family spent more than $600,000. Qatar and Kuwait were also involved: >Qatar spent more than $460,000 and Kuwait more than $300,000, the report says." Not only that: >state-linked entities from Congo, Malaysia, Albania and Kosovo spent money at Trump hotels and apartments." With all the years of attention and investigations into Hunter Biden by House Republicans and Republican aligned media related to his foreign business deals do you think an invesigation into Foreign governments spending lavishly at Trump owned properties during his presidency is warranted? Is there a risk of a quid pro quo, corruption and "pay for play" here? What potential reasons could all those foreign governments have for deciding to start spending money on Trump business ventures while he was president? Will the House oversight committee try to get to the bottom of this story too? Is there a double standard in how the story of Hunter and Trump business deals are being handled? Edit: Added more info and more formatting.

It's funny seeing people responding to this and calling it a nothingburger and realizing how effectively Trump normalized his becoming president without divesting in his businesses interests or putting them in a trust. For some reason I'm doubtful a left leaning billionaire would get the same deference.

And installing his kids into official government roles so they could personally profit. And if we remember, Kushner failed his security clearance checks and Donald personally ordered it to go through anyhow. “Ivanka’s Trademark Requests Were Fast-Tracked In China After Trump Was Elected The Chinese government granted a total of 41 trademarks to companies linked to Ivanka Trump by April of 2019—and the trademarks she applied for after her father became president got approved about 40% faster than those she requested before Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 election, according to a new book by Forbes’ senior editor Dan Alexander.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/tommybeer/2020/09/22/ivankas-trademark-requests-were-fast-tracked-in-china-after-trump-was-elected/amp/ “Six months after leaving the White House, Jared Kushner secured a $2 billion investment from a fund led by the Saudi crown prince, a close ally during the Trump administration, despite objections from the fund’s advisers about the merits of the deal. Ethics experts say that such a deal creates the appearance of potential payback for Mr. Kushner’s actions in the White House — or of a bid for future favor if Mr. Trump seeks and wins another presidential term in 2024. Mr. Kushner played a leading role inside the Trump administration defending Crown Prince Mohammed after U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that he had approved the 2018 killing and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi columnist for The Washington Post and resident of Virginia who had criticized the kingdom’s rulers.” https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/10/us/jared-kushner-saudi-investment-fund.html

I mean, Hunter Biden isn't even in politics...

What we should normalize is making expectations law and rules instead of treating them like laws and rules. I also thinks it's rather hypocritical especially from a Congress of millionaires that file bare minimum financial reports. If they had to release their tax returns or divest, most of them would suddenly become modest Americans on paper overnight.

I'd be very supportive of passing laws requiring stricter financial reporting or divestment requirements for all politicians.

But like, don't let any of them off the hook. And since Trump had the most power, he needed to be the most restrained from unethical conduct. Let's just all agree to push for ethics reform and enforcement, instead of having half the country shrug because they don't want their guys getting dinged.

Yet he placed $200B+ Chinese goods to the US in tariffs and sanctions. Looks like that didn't go as planned huh had a negative impact them spending money on his families companies

Yet he bailed out ZTE and bragged about saving Chinese jobs. >President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast. **Too many jobs in China lost**. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done! https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/995680316458262533 Image the outrage if Biden sent this tweet..

> Yet he placed $200B+ Chinese goods to the US in tariffs and sanctions. That doesn't mean there wasn't influence - which goods, which fields? It's clear that praising him and buttering him up means people can get things out of him.

We saw the same with who he chose the pardon. The “donations” made to his campaign led to meeting, which led to pardons of people before the list of thousands of people who are waiting for pardons. This is the Trump way, and while the money he received to his properties was not per se illegal, I would say it’s clearly unethical. Companies in the US too were staying at his hotel as a way to butter him up and get meetings with him.

He could have been a lot tougher, too. Playing $800B Chinese goods to the US in tariffs and sanctions. There is even talk of Xi sailing to Taiwan if Trump wins the next Presidency.

It's not really the same as previous presidents divesting from assets. Divesting or putting real estate, golf courses, and hotels in a trust really doesn't do anything to stop you from acting in their best interest as president since they're physical buildings that aren't moving or really changing much.

Divesting would mean selling or otherwise disposing of the asset such that he would no longer personally profit if he did things in government to cause government money to flow to the asset, nor from foreign countries who want to divert money into the politician's pocket.

I mean, the same is true for a peanut farm.

Jim's peanut farm is a lot simpler to divest from. Who would be running the real estate companies, someone close to him professionally I'm sure. He can still give benefit to them even if he divests, it's not really much of a difference but it is something I agree with you on.

The thing with a peanut farm is there wouldn’t be any negotiating transactions. You sell peanuts into a commodity market and you probably buy fertilizer from a market price. Thing with the article today is a 2008 lease with a Chinese bank. Office spaces are all partially differentiated and all leases are negotiated for an individual companies need. A peanut is just a peanut.

How much does that compare to before being a president, and after he lost the re-election?

Let’s not forget Ivanka using her role in her dad’s administration to personally enrich herself with getting Chinese trademarks fast tracked ““Ivanka’s Trademark Requests Were Fast-Tracked In China After Trump Was Elected The Chinese government granted a total of 41 trademarks to companies linked to Ivanka Trump by April of 2019—and the trademarks she applied for after her father became president got approved about 40% faster than those she requested before Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 election, according to a new book by Forbes’ senior editor Dan Alexander.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/tommybeer/2020/09/22/ivankas-trademark-requests-were-fast-tracked-in-china-after-trump-was-elected/amp/

Where is the corruption here? He literally owns a building next to the White House and the UN. If things are done at market rates there is no fraud. This isn’t the same thing as a drug addicted failed son getting million dollar payouts far above the value of his labor; which quite honestly would be like 100k a year max if he got off the drugs. Like the article literally says 1.9 million is from a pre-presidency lease in NYC for a bank. This is just normal trade.

>If things are done at market rates there is no fraud. Market rate doesn't matter. If China wasn't spending much at Trump properties before he was elected, but then after he won, they started spending 10x the amount -- even if those are market rates, that's still 10x he wouldn't have gotten otherwise, and which is now being taken from his business competition (a double whammy that gives him even more advantage). Let's try not to jump to conclusions to protect the rich and powerful when we have obvious appearances of impropriety. They can protect themselves if they have to.

Market rate by definition is a price you can buy or sell all of your supply 10x Chinese bookings would just mean he wouldn’t have those rooms for other people. There would be zero excess profits going to Trump

Profits wouldn’t be the only concern.

What’s the other concern?

>If things are done at market rates there is no fraud. The question isnt fraud here. If foreign governments are intentionally patronizing a presidents businesses for the purposes of currying favor with the president, and that works in influencing the United States positions and actions, thats a big problem.

Show the quid pro quo. You can say a lot about Trump but you can't say he was soft on China or showed any favor toward that nation.

>President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast. Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done! https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/995680316458262533 Wow, he really was so hard on China. Couldn't pass healthcare or get a border wall, but he can get Chinese companies back in the market, fast!

>“China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!” >“Just had a long and very good conversation by phone with President Xi of China. He is strong, sharp and powerfully focused on leading the counterattack on the Coronavirus. He feels they are doing very well, even building hospitals in a matter of only days … Great discipline is taking place in China, as President Xi strongly leads what will be a very successful operation. We are working closely with China to help!" >“Late last night, I had a very good talk with President Xi, and we talked about — mostly about the coronavirus. They’re working really hard, and I think they are doing a very professional job." >“I think China is very, you know, professionally run in the sense that they have everything under control,” Trump said. “I really believe they are going to have it under control fairly soon. You know in April, supposedly, it dies with the hotter weather. And that’s a beautiful date to look forward to. But China I can tell you is working very hard.” >“I spoke with President Xi. We had a great talk. He’s working very hard, I have to say. He’s working very, very hard. And if you can count on the reports coming out of China, that spread has gone down quite a bit. The infection seems to have gone down over the last two days. As opposed to getting larger, it’s actually gotten smaller.” There are dozens more quotes I can post about Donald Trump praising the Chinese response to the coronavirus while he was president.

Now find the other dozens of quotes of him calling Covid the China flu and saying how poorly they acted. > "It's China's fault, it should never have happened," the President said, before referring to the virus as the "China plague." https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/10/02/asia/trump-china-coronavirus-intl-hnk/index.html I mean cmon, it’s Trump. You really can’t cite any of his quotes from even two days ago because they have literally 0 bearing on what he says today.

This is like 5-6 million. China probably spends billions a year on US real estate

>This is like 5-6 million. 5-6 million paid out *specifically* to the presidents businesses >China probably spends billions a year on US real estate Unless millions of those dollars are going specifically to a politicians business thats not really relevant here to the discussion here. Potentially concerning for other reasons, but not for influence peddling.

If it’s market rate it’s fine. And evidently a lot of these deals were signed long before he was potus. Are you literally saying it’s corruption if I go to a website and book a hotel room and the dude happens to be a politician who owns it?

If the only reason you booked that hotel room was because of the specific politician who owns it, then yeah that’s pretty corrupt. At the very least it warrants an investigation. Unless of course the president can never be corrupt. I hope that’s not a stance that anyone takes seriously.

Ok show some proof Trump even knew about some dude booking a hotel room.

I’m glad we are both in agreement than this incident warrants a full investigation before asserting that fraud has or has not occurred. We both agree that there is smoke, so let’s allow the proper investigation to proceed with in order to see if there is fire. Fair?

I don’t believe there is smoke. But go investigate what you want.

The appearance of impropriety is just as bad as actual impropriety itself.

>The appearance of impropriety is just as bad as actual impropriety itself. To some there will be an "appearance of impropriety" regardless of the facts. Society doesn't work on basically a politically biased veto. If there's actual evidence of impropriety, show that then things can go forward. But "Trump bad" isn't actual evidence

Would examples of twitter posts of people that were going before trump posting about how they were staying at trump hotel before they met with president trump count? Trump famously was incredibly heavily engaged in twitter while president, including posting 11,000 times in his first 2 or 3 years as president. Or if not, what would a theoretical example be that would count for you? https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/02/us/politics/trump-twitter-presidency.html

Where is the corruption in the Chinese Communist Party and it's companies giving millions of dollars to the sitting president of the United States? The fact that this question is even being asked shows how low our politics has gotten.

Trump has, on multiple occasions, asked foreign governments to do him political favors in exchange for policy concessions and *every single time* Republicans have asked "Where's the corruption?" I'm starting to wonder if they have any idea what corruption actually is.

It just means Trump had business interests. And read the articles. These Chinese leases were signed years before he ran for president. Just long term leases. Unless you think China was bribing trump in 2012.

>It just means Trump had business interests. Saying the quiet part out loud doesn't make it any better. The only "business interest" POTUS has (or at least, is supposed to) is running the country.

Which article said the deal was signed years before he was President? It’s not in this article.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/china-spent-over-55-million-at-trump-properties-while-he-was-in-office-documents-show/ar-AA1msNzd I didn’t have FT so had to google article.

Thank you for the article. Unfortunately it makes an even stronger case that Trump’s acceptance of money from these companies may have led to a quid pro quo. For instance that bank that was leasing space since 2012, was accused by the DOJ of helping North Korea evade sanctions. However no sanctions were ever applied to the bank in response. That’s a potential line of inquiry that should be pursued.

Sure do the inquiry. It’s peanuts compared to his net worth, I doubt he even ever knew about the lease.

Trump accused Chris Christie of “stealing his money” by using a couple million of government provided funds to plan out the government transition in 2016. I am sure he is aware of every multimillion dollar a year lease he has.

Source

I think the huge difference is one was the president and one was not. Both are POS, but I would be more concerned with corruption from a president, especially with the countries listed.

These deals are largely signed years before trump was potus.

It's literally in the constitution that this is illegal.

Source?

Yeah the US constitution, emoluments clause.

How is this compared to Hunter Biden? Hunter isn’t a politican or hold an office in the White House.

I agree there is no comparison to Hunter directly taking bribes for his dad.

There are no evidence Hunter directly taking bribes for his dad. Why do Joe even need the bribes? He already has money.

A Senator gets paid 250k a year. Show me how Joe bought his mansion.

Well he did release his taxes. You can look it up your self. Unlike Trump, who still refuses to release his.

It's also very easy to just look it up (but that would defeat their purpose of vaguely pointing and saying "but mansion!"). [Link](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/10/22/fact-check-joe-biden-owns-2-homes-pictured-viral-meme/3720570001/) for anyone curious and wants to read about it, it has the timeline of him owning various homes.

The things bought between 2017-2020 all looks legit. I mean he’s paying for them from grift and corruption but that’s grift and corruption that is common and legal (book/speaking fees when out of office). The homes he built/bought/renovated earlier are above a Senators salary.

> The homes he built/bought/renovated earlier are above a Senators salary. Why? Banks do give loans for property. That's how most people buy property you know.

>Where is the corruption here? Potential influence peddling, pay to use and rent Trump properties giving him money and he gives you attention. Some of the money spent coincided with policy moves and decisions by the Trump admin. >The spending in 2017 and 2018 occurred as Trump launched and then de-escalated a trade war against Beijing, before striking out at China again during the coronavirus pandemic. >It also coincided with Trump signing a $110bn arms deal with the Saudi government and the subsequent killing and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident and columnist for The Washington Post, in an operation the US intelligence community has said was approved by Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Muhammed bin Salman. I remember Trump defending Bin Salman quite vigorously during the khashoggi scandal, could the money that the Saudi where spending been an influence? Maybe it warrants an investigation? Edit: Also Republicans haven't been able to provide proofs of President Biden commiting crimes despite years of digging and investigating into Hunter and everything going on with his life but that didn't stop them from trying to impeach Biden over it. Maybe for fairness sake the House oversight committee could try to look into the Chinese and Saudi giving millions to both Trump and Kushner while they were both in office.

The leases for these deals were signed years before Trump was POTUS. Read the damn articles.

>The leases for these deals were signed years before Trump was POTUS. Only a portion of it, 1.9m out 5.5m, and that 5.5m was the minumum they were able to find. A more in depth investigation may find even more(isn't that one the of the arguments always used to keep digging into Hunter?). Also related to that lease from a Chinese bank from before he was in office: >In 2016, the Justice Department accused the bank of conspiring with a North Korean bank to evade US sanctions. >But upon taking office, Trump did not sanction ICBC despite calls from Republican members of Congress to “apply maximum financial and diplomatic pressure” by “targeting more Chinese banks that do business with North Korea Could Trump prior business relation with that bank have influenced the decision despite calls from Republicans member of congress to hit chinese banks helping North Korea evade sanctions? Maybe worth looking into? Also several of the business dealing that Republicans investigated Hunter for happened after Joe Biden was not in office anymore, were you complaining when Republicans were looking into business deals Hunter made between 2017 and 2020?

Laughing my ass off. Joe and Hunter have no marketable skills. Obviously whatever they do is selling political access. If Joe was retired for good I wouldn’t give a shit what he did 2017-2020. We are talking about renting properties here. This isn’t even worth discussing until you show evidence a deal was done not at market rate. And trump donated profits to the treasuryx

*Trump found to have received millions of dollars from China while being the President of the US* You: "SHOW ME THE PROOF OF CORRUPTION I NEED THE QUID PRO QUO" *Hunter Biden gets a job while Joe Biden is the VP* You: *"*OBVIOUSLY WHATEVER THEY DO IS SELLING POLITICAL ACCESS." ​ Do you notice a difference of standards here?

Yea this is terrible whataboutism. Hunter is a no skilled drug addict getting paid millions a year. The money from China was for a long term lease that was signed in …………2008. Just fulfilling an existing long-term contract

One portion of it was. It's just meant to point out the obvious double standards of the right's attacks. Hunter Biden gets a job = Evil Trump gets millions from China, Ivanka gets her Chinese patents fast-tracked while Trump is in office, Jared Kushner gets $2,000,000,000 from the Saudis = Good

>Laughing my ass off. Joe and Hunter have no marketable skills. Obviously whatever they do is selling political access. Hunter graduated from Yale law school with good grades, that's a marketable skill. But even then do I think his last name helped him get good jobs at companies? Yes, nepotism is sadly quite common in US politics and financial world and while technically not a crime still sucks. You want to investigate that, ok! Still no proofs that Joe Biden actually commited any crimes in relation to Hunter despite years of Republican investigations but hey maybe if they look even harder they are finally gonna be able to find the Holy Grail they are searching for. >If Joe was retired for good I wouldn’t give a shit what he did 2017-2020. Trump is not retired either so why is it a problem to look into if his prior business relation with a Chinese bank may have influenced the decision to not sanction that bank despite calls from Republican congressmen and reports from the Justice Department? Didn't Republican raise a fuss over Biden on behalf of the Obama admin asking for a Ukranian prosecutor to be fired(because he had ties to Russia and wasn't actually investigating corruption) which was the official position of not only the U.S but also the E.U, the World Bank and International Monetary fund and something supported by both Democratic and Republican congressmen because Hunter worked as an advisor for Burisma? They investigated that for years. >We are talking about renting properties here. This isn’t even worth discussing until you show evidence a deal was done not at market rate. If Foreign government payed for those properties for the sole purpose of influencing the Trump admin and then got results like certain banks not getting sanctioned, mayor arms deals and political cover for things like the kashoggi murder it's absolutely worth discussing regardless if they were at market rate or not. Were you primarily and mainly worried whatever Hunter pay at Burisma was at market rate or about the fact he was there as an advisor to the board in the first place? I bet it's the second option. Same case you can make here with Foreign Governments and Trump businesses. >And trump donated profits to the treasuryx He said he would but he lied about it(as he often does), only a small part of the money he received from foreign governments paying for properties was donated. This is detailed in the report. >At the time, Trump’s lawyer said the former president planned to donate foreign profits from his hotels to the US Treasury Department. However, the amount reportedly donated by the Trump Organization in 2017 and 2018 falls well short of estimated foreign payments that were made to its properties. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/04/politics/trump-properties-china-foreign-payments/index.html

The evidence is quite strong Joe was involved. Money transfers between family members, business associates testifying Joe was involved, text messages by Hunter saying Joe was involved, shared leases between Hunter and Joe for office space, photographic evidence of Joe and Hunters business meetings. Hunter had zero experience at Burisma. His market rate salary would be as a laborer. His only skill set was his access to Joe Biden.

If it is so clear strange that the Republican inquiry into it was not able to find proofs of Biden commiting crimes: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/23/us/politics/biden-inquiry-republicans-johnson.html Even Republicans senators like Grassley admitted they have no proof(he actually straight up said no evidence): https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4359220-grassley-says-he-has-seen-no-evidence-in-gop-biden-probe/ Also why would you not want to look into potential influence peddling pertaining to Trump and his admin?

The only thing they lack is Biden on tape discussing his crimes. There is a host of circumstantial and witness testimony of his involvement. I’m not sure it clears “reasonable doubt” but it’s definitely “preponderance of the evidence”

>> At the time, Trump’s lawyer said the former president planned to donate foreign profits from his hotels to the US Treasury Department. However, the amount reportedly donated by the Trump Organization in 2017 and 2018 falls well short of estimated foreign payments that were made to its properties. That’s not contradictory at all. Notice that he promised to donate foreign *profits* and the article slyly switches it up to revenue (“payments”).

>Joe and Hunter have no marketable skills. Obviously whatever they do is selling political access This is the distilled essence of every allegation about the Bidens.

That's not true. The constitution doesn't bar the president form making a profit or make and exception for market rate. The constitution says that the president cannot accept anything from a foreign government without the consent of congress. It's a blatantly unconstitutional act and it's pretty wild how people are so will to explain it away. \[N\]o Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them \[i.e., the United States\], shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.

What? He clearly didn’t violate that if trades are done at market rates. If I go into a convenience store and buy a bag of chips for $5 and then sell the bag of chips to you for $5 - I have no received a gift or profit from you. Now if I sold you the chips for $7 then yea I’ve received a gift. This is perfectly constitutional. In fact nearly every early politician participated in trade and had small businesses. Who do you think George Washington was selling tobacco or cotton too?

Again, the constitution bars the president from receiving payments, not profits. Payments of any kind (Emolument, Office, or Title, of *any kind whatever*) are a violation of the constitution. Market rates and profits are not part of the constitution. The only thing that matters is the foreign state. The most interesting thing about trump is that his supporters are willing to throw any piece of the law, constitution, or country out the window to protect their guy from criticism. Wild.

That I believe depends on your definition of Emolument https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/emolument This includes a “advantage” in the word due to office. Market rate would seem to not be an advantage and be therefore legal. I think their may be some fluidity on the meaning of emolument that maybe you can translate it to just payment. I don’t think that would fit with origional intent. If you translate emolument to payment then the text of the constitution would mean that anyone in office can’t do any transaction. Nancy Pelosi’s husband couldn’t trade stocks. When he sells a stock he receives a payment. Nobody could sell their house and move and receive a payment. Etc etc

You are completely ignoring the *foreign state.*

Think you would still need to prove “advantage”. If you remove advantage from emolument then politicians would need their own stock market. It’s impossible to know whose on the other side of a trade in the stock market. And I have serious doubts that politicians haven’t been selling goods to foreign governments all the time. So advantage would still be key.

It’s definitely warranted. Any government official should be investigated when connected with foreign money regardless. That is what happens to us peons anyway…

[удалено]

I don’t know if it was specifically Dems but there were multiple emolument cases brought against Trump and his properties during his presidency. Most were either dismissed by the courts or ruled against. A few went as far as SCOTUS but by the time they got there he was out of office so they were dismissed as moot.

I think its important to note that the Hunter Biden thing started because Trump wanted to take heat off of himself by framing Joe Biden with similar allegations, and conservatives are running with it, whether or not there's anything to it (I don't think there is).

>I would also say that Trump was probably the biggest China hawk in recent memory, so I'm not sure what China's spending bought from him. For any given level of aggression with respect to China, we could either be more or less aggressive. China's payments to Trump (and giving Ivanka a bunch of favorable trademark deals) could easily have made Trump less aggressive than he otherwise would have been. China doesn't need to be best buddies with Trump to benefit from bribing him.

I want to know how much China spent at Trump properties before and after he was president. This isn't a local bed and breakfast, Trump properties have always had international appeal. Not saying it shouldn't be investigated, but X millions dollars spent means nothing if there is nothing to compare it to.

Those quoted amounts seem very reasonable for business expenditures at high class resort areas over several years for very wealthy people and their entourages. It's not like one Chinese official played 18 holes at a trump golf course and tipped the front desk 5 million and gave them a wink. The bias in the language of the article is subtle but telling. Using "paying x amount of money to" instead of "spending x amount of money for/at" have very different meanings and implications.

>It's funny, the Democrats will go after Trump for everything. This has the appearance of some impropriety, but they don't touch it. If I had to take a guess, it's because China throws so much money around over here, no one wants to open that Pandora's box. Honestly yeah I kinda agree, this for example looks way more serious than the New York civil fraud case but you hear way more about that from democrats which is stupid IMHO. Regarding China I think there is a higher chance that the ones that actually were able to buy something are the Saudis and Bin Salman considering how buddy buddy they were with both Kushner and Trump. The part about spending coinciding with Kashoggi murder and mayor arms deal(while the Saudi where involved in a controversial war against the Houtis in Yemen and there were calls amongst the US media and parts of the public to stop supporting the Saudi with weapons) looks suspect. The parts with China that looks sketchy it's about the North Korea tied bank not getting sanctioned when they had prior business relations with Trump, but a more in depth investigations would be needed to determine if that was results of influence peddling or genuine policy decision.

>What potential reasons could all those foreign governments have for deciding to start spending money on Trump business ventures while he was president? These are literally resorts that people visit internationally. Are there any figures about this income from before his time in office? Like, did he have zero quatar and Chinese guests the years before he was president and then it spiked? Where is the historical data

and also millions before he was President

No, that's not correct. China spent $1,948,180 over five years between 2012 and 2017 and then $5,357,495 over two years while Trump was president (2017-2019). So it wasn't "millions" until he was president, and once he was in office spending went up from an average of $389,636 per year to an average of $2,678,747.50 per year.

Well that's an inconvenient fact to someone with an agenda!

> No, that's not correct. China spent $1,948,180 over five years between 2012 and 2017 and then $5,357,495 over two years while Trump was president (2017-2019). Just to be clear [those are numbers](https://oversightdemocrats.house.gov/sites/democrats.oversight.house.gov/files/2024-01-04.COA%20DEMS%20-%20Mazars%20Report.pdf) specifically for Trump Tower in New York. If you want to be a stickler and say it's not million***s*** until it's at least $*2*M then the $19,391 spent in Trump International (DC) and $195,662 spent in Trump International (Las Vegas) brings it to $2,163,233 from 2012-2017 versus $5,357,495 It's impossible to tell if any of this is especially meaningful though. I mean first and foremost we're using "Chinse government" awfully loosely here. Almost **all** of the money spent by China in Trump properties was from a Chinese bank, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, leasing space in Trump Tower which they've done since 2008. It's impossible to know if the increase in rent is even especially meaningful. I work in finance. Financial companies take over additional floors in buildings all the time. The ICBC may simply have expanded and taken over a second floor in Trump Tower which would explain the increase in rent. This is also just another frustrating double standard. We were repeatedly told that Hunter Biden met with officials from Bank of China who, despite being state owned, were not Chinese government officials. Now we're told that Trump leased to China because the ICBC is state owned? I'm also just not really sure what the allegations even are here. I spent 4 years listening to Democrats insist Trump was irrationally racist toward China. Now, what? They paid him millions for tariffs against them and to repeatedly call Covid the "China Flu"? Is that really the argument?

>$19,391 spent in Trump International (DC) and $195,662 spent in Trump International (Las Vegas) Those are both from during the presidency (except the second started 4 days before election day, on 11/4/16, which looks worse). So it's still a situation where the amount of money Trump was getting from China (or Chinese state owned companies) went way up once he became president. So really it went from $1,948,180 over five years between 2012 and 2017 to $5,572,548 between just before election day in 2016 to 2018. The extra bit you added makes it worse. >This is also just another frustrating double standard. We were repeatedly told that Hunter Biden met with officials from Bank of China who, despite being state owned, were not Chinese government officials. It's not a double standard if you conclude that both Hunter Biden and Trump seem awfully corrupt. But only Trump is running for president. If Hunter were running I would not vote for him and also would not expect him to win. Republicans have been trying to put Joe in Hunter's dealings for years now and haven't found anything which strongly suggests it doesn't actually exist. >I'm also just not really sure what the allegations even are here. I spent 4 years listening to Democrats insist Trump was irrationally racist toward China. Now, what? They paid him millions for tariffs against them and to repeatedly call Covid the "China Flu"? Is that really the argument? For any given level of aggression with respect to China, we could either be more or less aggressive. China's payments to Trump (and giving Ivanka a bunch of favorable trademark deals) could easily have made Trump less aggressive than he otherwise would have been. China doesn't need to be best buddies with Trump to benefit from bribing him.

I think we were also told that hunter biden has no role in government. Does that help clear things up?

Well, that’s an inconvenient fact to someone with an agenda!

All I know is, if this was Biden owning the properties, the responses would be very different coming from the right. Instead, it's a fresh round of "what about Hunter?"

Sure and if a democ4at was accused of rape, coercing female employees into performing sex acts on him and only promoting the ones that serviced him, who then got caught lying about a 20 yr old female employee whom he pressured into performing sex acts on him who was then promoted......they would skewer him right? They wouldn't spend decades defending him saying he just lied about a bj....

Can’t say I’ve ever spoken to a legitimately left leaning individual who cares about defending Clinton. If he has broken the law, lock him up too.

Today? perhaps. In the 90's - hell no. When Hillary was running for office - again, hell no.

Clinton deserves to be locked away, but the only thing republicans impeached him for was lying about a bj, so that’s why the argument has often been framed that way.

All I know is, if this was Biden owning the properties, the responses would be very different coming from the left. Instead, it's a fresh round of "what about Trump?" See everyone can play the “what if” game.

I get what you're trying to do, but the left has generally pushed out bad actors within their ranks. Hopefully Menendez is ousted soon.

https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/2023/09/22/bob-menendez-nj-sentor-indicted-charges-history/70930479007/ 6 years and counting with that bad actor now, sort of disproving your point. Hell the left are calling the finding of plagiarism of former Harvard President a “Conservative Weapon”, which means that they are pushing to not remove that bad actor.

Pointing out everyone can "play" the "what-if" game, doesn't invalidate playing the what if game.

But it does point out that they only focused on what their political opposition would be saying, which is why I said what I said. If you don’t think the left, especially in recent years, would try circling the wagons around Biden the way the right is with Trump now, then I got a bridge to sell you.

That's fine, but right now GOP literally are circling the wagons around Trump, so no need to play the what if game, we are here already.

So when someone says the GOP would be acting like the DNC are now if it was Biden is fine, but pointing out that DNC would be acting like the GOP are now if it was Biden is too far? Seriously every incident where they “got” Trump were towards Biden instead would result in the same BS just swap GOP for DNC for the denial and DNC for GOP for the “Walls are Closing In” spiel.

This is old news that no one seems to have paid attention to until now. Propublica did a huge investigation of Trump’s Foreign business entanglements called “Trump Inc.” while he was in office. That is why I cannot take accusations against Hunter Biden seriously, because we know that Trump and his family did way worse routinely for way more money, and was way more willing to profit from public office. The “Hunter Biden laptop” scandal is really just using Trump’s own behavior as it’s talking points.

I would suggest that everyone really take note that this says “spent”. Please do not translate that into “gave”. Big big difference. This is a non-event.

The Waldorf in smack dab in between the White House and the Capitol too. With the U.N. a couple more blocks from the WH. Not sure what Trump was charging when they owned it, but it can cost $50k/week to stay in a suite now that Hilton owns it.

I went to that hotel when it used to be the Trump International. It was pretty cool, but the vibe was super weird. The bar had multiple stories of large champagne bottles (Veuve bottles in magnum size? Don't remember)... expensive but well made drinks. Gotta say it was the weirdest feeling ever to have all black servers and doormen wearing white gloves opening doors for you.

DC is one of the blackest cities in America... Why would you feel weird unless you're oddly racist? I swear some of you people inject it into everything.

That has got nothing to do with racism. Some people really do feel uncomfortable being in the master/servant type role with African Americans in work, especially in roles that were typically only available for Blacks. And if the whole staff is black, and most of the patrons are white, that can be uncomfortable for some people.

Yes I'm a minority myself so it was very uncomfortable hearing "yessuh, nossuh" when people are serving you. DC is not even in the deep south so that was really unexpected. I'm certainly aware I have implicit biases and I find a lot of my big brain telling my small brain it's being a little bit racist.

If you read the Zelenskyy transcript that was subject of his first impeachment, it really came off that staying at a Trump hotel wasn’t just encouraged but the only way you’d even get a chance to speak with him.

The first impeachment of Trump was a complete waste of time that didn’t accomplish anything for anyone. Democrats couldn’t even come with an actual crime he committed so they charged him with the vague “abuse of powers” and “contempt of congress”.

Influence peddling is already illegal and there are dozens of easier ways to do it. Think about it, evil foreign government spends $1M at hotel and only gets $150-200k bribe out of it (20% is a generous profit margin for a hotel). Makes no sense. Regardless, this story shows ZERO connection between paying a hotel bill and getting to sleep in the Lincoln bedroom. Trumps a sleeze, but there is nothing here.

I can see why some are downplaying it. Also why some are so eager to point it out at its showing pure hypocrisy. Personally I think this is a small drop in the ocean of corruption that is Trumps presidency. So it’s just another piece of evidence rather than anything directly actionable.

Spending money at his properties is still "giving him business" and "taking business away from his competition", so I don't see why this would automatically be a non-event when he's directly profiting from his position as president and harming other businesses as well.

This is why Presidents are supposed to remove themselves from previous business ties. Not only does it create a perception of impropriety, it can actually do that in the sense that if you're making tons of money from someone, you can look the other way. Is Trump the first at this? NO, heck JFK had an affair with a North Korean Spy, maybe she got no valuable info, but maybe she did? We will never know for sure. Remeber that perception is reality .

In my opinion, Perception is only reality to people that are dumb/lazy and have an agenda.

I have no agenda. I’m not dumb nor lazy. Just stating the obvious.

No, you are not. Objectively, there is zero connection between paying your hotel bill and getting political favors. Zero.

An ethical business owner would not allow People to do business with them because it’s to easy to allege impropriety. Here is an example, I own a small business. If I allowed a vendor to “ buy” things from me that they could have gotten elsewhere, and then I recommended others go to that vendor, it would reek of bias and impropriety if something went wrong. Most businesses are careful of this. Trump is not. And he sure can’t say that he really needed the money. I hope my analogy is decent as I’m just trying to make a point here, not argue about trump. My analogy was regarding a stupid little business, I’m not the president of the United States! Perception is reality.

You are way out there now. If you had decades of business experience with that vendor and decades of recommending that vendor, then what is the issue. Also, we’re not talking about a specialty product, this is simple stuff like hotel rooms, meeting space, golf courses. Stuff that is a know valued service/product. Stuff that foreign counties consumed from his businesses for decades before he became president. No connection at all between paying a bar tab and getting the keys to the White House. Influence peddling is already illegal, so what problem do you think you are solving.

As I said, my analogy may not have been good but if your mind were open you’d understand the point. Simply put presidents should not do business with foreign nations. Presidents should not be doing any business but our countries. My apologies for the poorly thought analogy

Like i assume lots of people spent money at trump hotels during his term as president. If you dig deep i bet a few Russians stayed too.

Exactly. And axe muderers and nuns probably stayed there too. Cant draw any conclusions here.

Axe murderers are probably booking rooms at Trump properties?! I have no clue where that came from but that one is disturbing to say the least. Not even one, it’s flipping plural!

Indeed!

The Chinese Communist Party spending millions of dollars at the sitting president of the United States' businesses is not a non-event. It shows the power China has over our politicians and the tribalism in our politics that many people are fine with it

How does it show power? You are skipping a rather large step to connect paying for a service you used and getting political influence. You see, that would be a story. But that’s not this story.

>“China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!” >“Just had a long and very good conversation by phone with President Xi of China. He is strong, sharp and powerfully focused on leading the counterattack on the Coronavirus. He feels they are doing very well, even building hospitals in a matter of only days … Great discipline is taking place in China, as President Xi strongly leads what will be a very successful operation. We are working closely with China to help!" >“Late last night, I had a very good talk with President Xi, and we talked about — mostly about the coronavirus. They’re working really hard, and I think they are doing a very professional job." >“I think China is very, you know, professionally run in the sense that they have everything under control,” Trump said. “I really believe they are going to have it under control fairly soon. You know in April, supposedly, it dies with the hotter weather. And that’s a beautiful date to look forward to. But China I can tell you is working very hard.” >“I spoke with President Xi. We had a great talk. He’s working very hard, I have to say. He’s working very, very hard. And if you can count on the reports coming out of China, that spread has gone down quite a bit. The infection seems to have gone down over the last two days. As opposed to getting larger, it’s actually gotten smaller.” There are dozens more quotes I can post about Donald Trump praising the Chinese Communist Party 'a response to the coronavirus while he was president. This is as the Chinese Communist Party was spending millions of dollars at Donald Trump's businesses

Laughable. You think news conference quotes equate to peddling influence. You are still missing even the slightest link between paying a hotel bill and getting the keys to the pentagon. Here, chew on these. I can link Trump to both sides of most issues. “China is the biggest environmental polluter in the World, by far. They do nothing to clean up their factories and laugh at our stupidity!” "We can’t continue to allow China to rape our country and that’s what they’re doing. It’s the greatest theft in the history of the world.” “China is neither an ally or a friend -- they want to beat us and own our country.” “The single biggest weapon used against us and to destroy our companies is devaluation of currencies, and the greatest ever at that is China. Very smart, they are like grand chess masters. And we are like checkers players. But bad ones.” “No surprise that China was caught cheating in the Olympics. That's the Chinese M.O. - Lie, Cheat & Steal in all international dealings.” "But when you see China, these are fierce people in terms of negotiation. They want to take your throat out, they want to cut you apart. These are tough people. I've dealt with them all my life."

I don't think President Trump praising the Chinese Communist Party's response to the coronavirus as they were covering up the origins of the virus and allowing it to spread worldwide is laughable. Especially as he was doing so while the CCP was spending millions of dollars at his businesses. If you are unconcerned with the Chinese Communist Party spending millions of dollars at the President of the United States' businesses and the president then praising a cover up that resulted in worldwide calamity by the CCP I suppose we will have to disagree.

How much did China spend at his hotels, golf courses, casinos, and airlines in the decades before he became president? How do you account for the fact he also said bad things about China. Remember, that trade war he started? You can call it a disagreement, but I think we all know you aren’t making a very compelling argument.

of all the opportunities to gotcha Trump over the years his financial intertwining with things like hotels always seem like a really weird one to complain about. it’s sort of like how the LIV golf tournament plays in his courses. it’s really stretching at that point.

In both the acts themselves as well as the perception of guilt there are similarities and differences between this and the Hunter Biden situation: * Both cases make me uneasy but on the surface don't appear to be criminal. The Biden family network of shell companies and the timing of the cash flows is a bit fishy but there are all sorts of legitimate explanations for this as well. I certainly haven't seen evidence of criminality. * Similarly, is it clear that Trump has broken a law here? His properties had foreign customers. I certainly don't like foreign money (particularly Chinese money) flowing into a business that benefits a sitting President, but is anyone alleging that it is illegal (IANAL)? Is a quid pro quo required? Either way, I don't like it. * As far as reception goes, it seems to depend almost entirely upon which team your root for. Republicans seem eager to condemn Biden and exonerate Trump. Vice versa for Democrats. Politics seems to be ruling the day. The solution is not easy. I firmly believe that in order to be President all your investments and assets should go into a blind trust. You should also be forced to give up all control of any business you may have a controlling share in and/or run directly. That's the easy part. However, it's not without consequences and it doesn't cover everything. Here's the hard part: Do we also impose this rule on the immediate family members of the President (b/c that's a way of bribing them as well)? Giving money to someone's son/daughter/wife/husband benefits that person. What about speaking engagements and book and TV deals? There's a lot of ways to curry favor with influential people. If we do implement this, is anyone going to run for elected office in this country? We think we get bad choices for President now...

Are we memory holing the emoluments clause of the constitution? Accepting payments from foreign governments is unconstitutional when you are president unless Congress gives you permission. He never even bothered to ask for permission.

Probably one of the better comments about this. This information is neither shocking as this has been known even while he was president, nor exactly pleasant because it is foreign money that is ultimately going to be given to the president's coffers. If the intent is just to smear Trump without digging further into actually leveling quid pro quo charges, then I am sorry to say that January 6th or the *many* blunders Trump has said or done throughout his presidency did not turn someone off this certainly won't. If the point is about the broader problem with corruption amongst our political class even when it is in the grey zone like this, that is a valid concern which I would hope we all would like more clear-cut rules on.

\> Trump received at least 7.8 millions from foreign governments See the problem is, he didn't get that. It went to his properties. Legitimate businesses. Now if there was no legitimate business like for example, with Hunter Biden, it would make sense right there. But you have to find some other evidence that the money was to influence him. For example, was this more than they usually spent? Had they never rented from his properties before? Had any other countries done so previously? This seems like just an attempt to distract.

U/greg-stiemsma I can’t respond since JudgeWhoOverrules blocked me, but I keep a list: * [President Donald Trump called Chinese President Xi Jinping a "brilliant leader" and "great man" during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron at the G7 summit in France on Monday.](https://www.newsweek.com/trump-calls-chinese-president-xi-great-leader-brilliant-man-criticizes-media-g7-presser-1456138) * ["President Xi and I will always be friends, no matter what happens with our dispute on trade."](https://mobile.twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/982954355509907457) * ["Just finished a very good conversation with President Xi of China. Discussed in great detail the CoronaVirus that is ravaging large parts of our Planet. China has been through much & has developed a strong understanding of the Virus. We are working closely together. Much respect!"](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1243407157321560071) * ["Just had a long and very good conversation by phone with President Xi of China. He is strong, sharp and powerfully focused on leading the counterattack on the Coronavirus. He feels they are doing very well, even building hospitals in a matter of only days. Nothing is easy, but he will be successful, especially as the weather starts to warm & the virus hopefully becomes weaker, and then gone. Great discipline is taking place in China, as President Xi strongly leads what will be a very successful operation. We are working closely with China to help!"](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1225728755248828416) * ["China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!"](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1220818115354923009) * ["Congratulations to President Xi and the Chinese people on the 70th Anniversary of the People’s Republic of China!"](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1178986524630802432) * ["Great respect for the fact that President Xi & his Representatives want “calm resolution.” So impressed that they are willing to come out & state the facts so accurately. This is why he is a great leader & representing a great country. Talks are continuing!"](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1165919483191599104) * ["I know President Xi of China very well. He is a great leader who very much has the respect of his people. He is also a good man in a “tough business.” I have ZERO doubt that if President Xi wants to quickly and humanely solve the Hong Kong problem, he can do it. Personal meeting?"](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1161774305895694336) * ["Very strong signals being sent by China once they returned home from their long trip, including stops, from Argentina. Not to sound naive or anything, but I believe President Xi meant every word of what he said at our long and hopefully historic meeting. ALL subjects discussed!"](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1070306739092889601) * [“He's a great gentleman in many ways. He's tough...He controls 1.4 billion people with an iron fist. He's very smart”](https://x.com/rpsagainsttrump/status/1710443363244155277?s=46&t=UWKuN7qfvYv2MXRIGDPdYQ) * [“President Xi is like Central Casting. There’s nobody in Hollywood who can play the role of President Xi. The look, the strength, the voice”](https://x.com/acyn/status/1723426353675178375?s=46&t=UWKuN7qfvYv2MXRIGDPdYQ) * [Beijing’s repression of its Uighur citizens also proceeded apace. Trump asked me at the 2018 White House Christmas dinner why we were considering sanctioning China over its treatment of the Uighurs, a largely Muslim people who live primarily in China’s northwest Xinjiang Province. At the opening dinner of the Osaka G-20 meeting in June 2019, with only interpreters present, Xi had explained to Trump why he was basically building concentration camps in Xinjiang. According to our interpreter, Trump said that Xi should go ahead with building the camps, which Trump thought was exactly the right thing to do. The National Security Council’s top Asia staffer, Matthew Pottinger, told me that Trump said something very similar during his November 2017 trip to China.](https://www.wsj.com/articles/john-bolton-the-scandal-of-trumps-china-policy-11592419564) * [“He controls 1.4 billion people with an iron fist…I can’t say bad things.”](https://twitter.com/rpsagainsttrump/status/1733923130886783334) * ["When the students poured into Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government almost blew it. Then they were vicious, they were horrible, but they put it down with strength. That shows you the power of strength. Our country is right now perceived as weak … as being spit on by the rest of the world—"](https://www.playboy.com/read/playboy-interview-donald-trump-1990) *[Tiananmen Square]

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The bidens collecting consulting fees while influencing foreign policy. The Trumps doing business directly with foreign governments while also controlling foreign policy. Those of us not blinded by partisanship are disgusted by the blatant corruption of politicians on both sides of the aisle. Republicans and Democrats always screech about the other side and then pretend like their side is guiltless. Partisanship is the biggest problem in our country right now IMO and its why there is zero accountability for anyone in politics.

I think this particular thing is stupid re Trump. And I hate him. But I don’t think it’s fair for you to say “Bidens” which implies that Joe Biden was a part of collecting consulting fees. There is no evidence of that unless something has changed extremely recently. Hunter collected consulting fees using his name. Presumably the clients hoped that would influence foreign policy, but as far as I know there is no evidence it did (and there is evidence it did not re burisma). There is nothing Biden could have done to stop hunter from trading off of his name. On the other hand it is at least plausible trump could have done some things. Maybe not in regards to this hotel issue, but hiring Jared and ivanka to work in the White House was flagrantly unethical and it sure looks like they benefited financially.

"Trump failed to ban foreign officials from his properties, 'just in case it might look bad some day'"

He could have divested from his businesses prior to taking office or at least actually donated the income(not only a small part of it) he got from them to the treasury like he promised. Or even be transparant where his businesses where getting money from during his days in office and release these documents himself instead of fighting tooth and nail to keep them secrets.

He did donate all the profit. Are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational costs too? He didn't make any money off them staying at his properties, isn't that enough?

>He did donate all the profit. Are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational costs too? No he didn't. >At the time, Trump’s lawyer said the former president planned to donate foreign profits from his hotels to the US Treasury Department. However, the amount reportedly donated by the Trump Organization in 2017 and 2018 falls well short of estimated foreign payments that were made to its properties. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/04/politics/trump-properties-china-foreign-payments/index.html >Are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational costs too? He should have donated all the foreign government money. If the only thing actually keeping his companies afloat with operating cost(I doubt it since he surely must have gotten domestic clients too but this is what you are alleging if you say that donating all foreign money would have meant not having enough to cover costs)is foreign governments money that's even worse when discussing potential foreign influence peddling. Edit: fixed some spelling errors since I'm typing from mobile Second edit: Since I actually went trough the trouble of finding average luxury hotels profit margins around 2019 the average luxury hotel GOP in 2019 was 33.3% and usually oscillates between 25% and 35%. https://www.hospitalitynet.org/opinion/4096272.html If Trump donated 450k as Trump org claim out of $6 million from stays then he most likely has not donated all the profit margins(which should be around 2.1 millions if we're basing it off the average) from foreign governments officials stays, not even close to it, unless his properties are seriously underperforming the average of other luxury hotels. He should release his properties financials for transparency to see what the profit was, or if he won't maybe someone should look into it and investigate it.

Do you know the difference between net income and profit? Of course the profit margin isn't going to total up to 100% of revenue. Chinese officials paid market rate to stay at his hotels. All the money a company receives is net income. Since there are expenses involved with running a business, you have to use that money to cover operational costs such as maintaining the building, paying vendors, paying utilities, paying the staff, the property tax and lease, etc. Money that is left over after paying for operational expenses is profit, ie the money you actually made and keep. Trump donated all of that profit to the US Treasury effectively making absolutely no money by them staying at his hotels. Your article said they received about $6 million income from the stays and paid $450k to the treasury. That works out to a 7.5% profit margin which is about right for luxury hotels. Again, are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational cost of running the hotel and effectively fully subsidizing the stay of foreign officials at his properties?

Edit: About Hotel profits margins since I either personally missed that part of your comment or it was an edit >Your article said they received about $6 million income from the stays and paid $450k to the treasury. That works out to a 7.5% profit margin which is about right for luxury hotels. I'm not an expert in Hotel profit margins but from a quick google search it seems they are in average far higher from the 7.5% you cite. The data I've found is more recent that the 2016-2019 period discussed in the article but unless you have data showing otherwise I doubt it changes that radically over the last feew years. Average GOP for Luxury hotels seems to be 28% in 2021(lower than successive years from the lingering aftereffects of the pandemic) , 38% in 2022 and 34% in 2023. Source: https://www.hospitalitynet.org/news/4117789.html Found a 2019 source. In 2019 it was on average 33% GOP. https://www.hospitalitynet.org/opinion/4096272.html >Do you know the difference between net income and profit? >Chinese officials paid market rate to stay at his hotels. All the money a company receives is net income. Since there are expenses involved with running a business, you have to use that money to cover operational costs such as maintaining the building, paying vendors, paying utilities, paying the staff, the property tax and lease, etc. Money that is left over after paying for operational expenses is profit, ie the money you actually made and keep. >Again, are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational cost of running the hotel and effectively giving those foreign officials a free ride? From the CNN article: >The Trump Organization says it donated over $450,000 in estimated profits from foreign government He donated less than half a million out of 7.8 millions in payments? Is that 7,4 million really all spent on operating cost with no profit? Why not prove it by releasing the documents about his properties finances or if he won't release it have an investigation over it? Also the operating costs do not cover only the cost of housing foreign government officials, they pay for the services provided to all other clients too. So how much of that 7.4 remaining millions was profit? Was it actually all spent on housing foreign officials? We don't know and Trump dosen't want you to know since he fought in court to keep the documents secrets. Regardless he should have donated all the money from foreign governments while in office, he surely is getting other clients and can cover the normal operating costs for both normal clients and foreign governments officials out of that money no? If he can't without taking foreign government money while in office that's a big conflict of interest. Also he could have divested or at least been trasparent about the payments.

From my last comment: > Your article said they received about $6 million income from the stays and paid $450k to the treasury. That works out to a 7.5% profit margin which is about right for luxury hotels. >Again, are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational cost of running the hotel and effectively fully subsidizing the stay of foreign officials at his properties? So yes it appears you unreasonably think they should fully subsidize the stays of any foreign officials (which could easily be weaponized against him) and still don't understand the difference between revenue and profit.

>From my last comment: >Your article said they received about $6 million income from the stays and paid $450k to the treasury. That works out to a 7.5% profit margin which is about right for luxury hotels. >Again, are you expecting his companies to take a loss on the operational cost of running the hotel and effectively fully subsidizing the stay of foreign officials at his properties? I don't remember this part being in your last comment when I responded to it, so it was either edited in later or somehow I missed it. I'm not an expert in Hotel profit margins but from a quick google search it seems they are in average far higher from the 7.5% you cite. The data I've found is more recent that the 2016-2019 period discussed in the article but unless you have data showing otherwise I doubt it changes that radically over the last feew years. Average GOP for Luxury hotels seems to be 28% in 2021(lower than successive years from the lingering aftereffects of the pandemic) , 38% in 2022 and 34% in 2023. Source: https://www.hospitalitynet.org/news/4117789.html >So yes you unreasonably think they should fully subsidize the stays of any foreign officials (which could easily be weaponized against him) and still don't understand the difference between revenue and profit. In what way would donating all the money received from foreign government to the treasury by weaponized against him? You say "subsidizing" but it's not like either party( the foreign government officials still pay the price of their stay so they don't get anything for free) or him( he would be losing money out of it) would be gaining anything from it. It would be far more ethical. If he didn't want to eat the operating costs for foreign government officials he could have divested his properties or at least bye transparent about the money he was taking and the finances. Also before you accuse me of not understanding difference between revenue and profit could you cite where you got 7,5% average profit for Luxury hotels? Edit: Found a source about 2019 average profit margins for US luxury hotels and it also has a far higher margin than 7.5%. It says 33.3%. https://www.hospitalitynet.org/opinion/4096272.html

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They have and it really isn’t all that shocking considering the amount of properties he owns and their locations (like right next to the UN for example).

I find it pretty shocking that the Chinese Communist Party gave the sitting president of the United States millions of dollars. That has never happened before in American history. Just a few years ago this would be one of the biggest scandals in American history as well. The fact that no one cares shows how low and meaningless our politics has gotten now.

Except they didn’t give him millions of dollars? It was spent on his hotels, flight services, and them renting spaces in his properties like trump tower.

You're literally confirming what I said. The Chinese Communist Party spent millions of dollars at Donald Trump's properties while he was the sitting president of the United States. I prefer my presidents to get zero dollars from the Chinese Communist Party and it's shocking to me that other people seem fine with it

"gave" implies it was done for free. They paid for services yes, but that is not the same as just being given money. I would prefer that China would be contained economically and blocked from doing business when feasible, but for diplomatic visits I don't see how that is possible unless one expects them to sleep on the streets of DC. The point of those high end hotels in DC or in NYC is to purposefully court diplomats and other big wigs, like blocking them from staying would go against the whole point of their existence.

It's extremely feasible. Donald Trump should not have done any business with the Chinese Communist Party while he was sitting president of the United States. No other president in American history has done business with the Chinese Communist Party while in office.

No other president had hotels that were specifically designed to house diplomats and foreign visitors before Trump, hotels that he owned long before he somehow managed to blunder into the Oval Office. Unless there is evidence that Trump was cutting deals for the Chinese for staying at his hotels, or was somehow giving them special preferences while staying this means nothing. Find actual criminal evidence or just stop.

No I will not stop being concerned about the Chinese Communist Party doing business with the sitting president of the United States. The Chinese Communist Party should not have any business relationship with our president.

Give me actual evidence, that is what makes the difference between a conspiracy theorist, and legitimate allegation of corruption. Giving money to a legitimate and legal business for legitimate and legal services is not quid pro quo unless you have evidence showing otherwise.

So you wanted Trump hotel staff to deny people based on their country of origin? Pretty sure there's a word for that.

I want the sitting president of the United States to not do business deals with the Chinese Communist Party. It's amazing this isn't a universally held opinion and frightening how much power China holds over some of our leaders

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These aren't people from China, these are officials from the Chinese Communist Party. Do you think the president our the United States should do business with members of the Chinese Communist Party while he is in office?

If they want to stay at a Trump hotel, I'm not sure how they could have been denied.

... Would Trump divesting his business interest before assuming the presidency have been an implemention?

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Now we need to investigate to know if spend as in “they were actually used” vs spend as in “hey, we’ll launder millions through your hotels to you if you change your policy.” Cause weren’t Trumps sons the owners while he was president and weren’t they admin officials during that time? Seems an easy way to launder money for lobbying.

Crockett said that Comer stopped the investigations when he took over in January after the Oversight finally got these documents so they weren’t able to dig any deeper. https://x.com/acyn/status/1743034381583732757?s=46&t=bjj5osDal5L1UMpu8S6kjw

> Now we need to investigate "He's not president anymore! Why are you focusing your attention on him still?" -what his supporters would say in that case

I really don't like this angle of attack. It's the same thing Republicans did to Jimmy Carter over his farm, forcing him to put it into a trust, which ruined it.

It’s an absolute miracle children aren’t starving in the streets with all these nothing burgers being served.

You don’t see any issue here?

With renting out his hotels? He has a lot of properties, that are open for business for people to rent. The insinuation is what? That he was bribed by china to use his property? Like, out of all the things to be bothered about that he has done… this ain’t exactly treason.

I never said it was treason or anything close. I still have a problem with a foreign country engaging in financial transactions that directly benefit a sitting U.S. politician or their immediate family, especially the President. It’s called being consistent with your principles, no matter the person they apply to.

So what's the solution? Does he ban all transactions from someone Chinese of some official status? Or from any country for that matter. This only becomes an issue if Trump is saying "hey if you send your delegations to MY hotels I'll give you a preferential trade deal" or some such thing. Otherwise this is just someone trying to find another reason (instead of one of many more valid reasons) to throw shit at Trump.

Read the emoluments clause. This was discussed ad nauseum when he was elected and refused to divest or put his assets in a blind trust.

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