{"id":28909,"date":"2016-09-16T06:14:18","date_gmt":"2016-09-16T03:14:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/?p=28909"},"modified":"2016-09-16T06:14:18","modified_gmt":"2016-09-16T03:14:18","slug":"trumps-global-deals-would-make-it-impossible-for-him-to-conduct-foreign-policy-in-many-countries-without-padding-or-depleting-his-wallet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/2016\/09\/16\/trumps-global-deals-would-make-it-impossible-for-him-to-conduct-foreign-policy-in-many-countries-without-padding-or-depleting-his-wallet\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s global deals would make it impossible for him to conduct foreign policy in many countries without padding or depleting his wallet."},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"dbebbc8e642739d63d7417ce1893e709\" data-index=\"5\" style=\"float: none; margin:10px 0 10px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script>\r\n<!-- Beautiful Ads -->\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:inline-block;width:728px;height:90px\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-7527341994815378\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"3477329686\"><\/ins>\r\n<script>\r\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-28911 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-15-at-8.01.46-PM-300x18.png\" alt=\"screen-shot-2016-09-15-at-8-01-46-pm\" width=\"666\" height=\"40\" srcset=\"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-15-at-8.01.46-PM-300x18.png 300w, https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-15-at-8.01.46-PM-768x45.png 768w, https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-15-at-8.01.46-PM-1024x60.png 1024w, https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/Screen-Shot-2016-09-15-at-8.01.46-PM.png 1558w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 666px) 100vw, 666px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>By Kurt Eichenwal, Newsweek<\/p>\n<p>If Donald Trump is elected president, will he and his family permanently sever all connections to the Trump Organization, a sprawling business empire that has spread a secretive financial web across the world? Or will Trump instead choose to be the most conflicted president in American history, one whose business interests will constantly jeopardize the security of the United States?<\/p>\n<p>Throughout this campaign, the Trump Organization, which pumps potentially hundreds of millions of dollars into the Trump family\u2019s bank accounts each year, has been largely ignored. As a private enterprise, its businesses, partners and investors are hidden from public view, even though they are the very people who could be enriched by\u2014or will further enrich\u2014Trump and his family if he wins the presidency.<\/p>\n<p>A close examination by Newsweek of the Trump Organization, including confidential interviews with business executives and some of its international partners, reveals an enterprise with deep ties to global financiers, foreign politicians and even criminals, although there is no evidence the Trump Organization has engaged in any illegal activities. It also reveals a web of contractual entanglements that could not be just canceled. If Trump moves into the White House and his family continues to receive any benefit from the company, during or even after his presidency, <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em>almost every foreign policy decision he makes will raise serious conflicts of interest and ethical quagmires.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Mumbai Shuffle<\/p>\n<p>The Trump Organization is not like the Bill, Hillary &amp; Chelsea Clinton Foundation, the charitable enterprise that has been the subject of intense scrutiny about possible conflicts for the Democratic presidential nominee. There are allegations that Hillary Clinton bestowed benefits on contributors to the foundation in some sort of \u201cpay to play\u201d scandal when she was secretary of state, but that makes no sense because there was no \u201cpay.\u201d Money contributed to the foundation was publicly disclosed and went to charitable efforts, such as fighting neglected tropical diseases that infect as many as a billion people. The financials audited by PricewaterhouseCoopers, the global independent accounting company, and the foundation\u2019s tax filings show that about 90 percent of the money it raised went to its charitable programs. (Trump surrogates have falsely claimed that it was only 10 percent and that the rest was used as a Clinton \u201cslush fund.\u201d) No member of the Clinton family received any cash from the foundation, nor did it finance any political campaigns. In fact, like the Clintons, almost the entire board of directors works for free.<\/p>\n<p>On the other hand, the Trump family rakes in untold millions of dollars from the Trump Organization every year. Much of that comes from deals with international financiers and developers, many of whom have been tied to controversial and even illegal activities. None of Trump\u2019s overseas contractual business relationships examined by Newsweek were revealed in his campaign\u2019s financial filings with the Federal Election Commission, nor was the amount paid to him by his foreign partners. (The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for the names of all foreign entities in partnership or contractually tied to the Trump Organization.) Trump\u2019s financial filings also indicate he is a shareholder or beneficiary of several overseas entities, including Excel Venture LLC in the French West Indies and Caribusiness Investments SRL, based in the Dominican Republic, one of the world\u2019s tax havens.<\/p>\n<p>Trump\u2019s business conflicts with America\u2019s national security interests cannot be resolved so long as he or any member of his family maintains a financial interest in the Trump Organization during a Trump administration, or even if they leave open the possibility of returning to the company later. The Trump Organization cannot be placed into a blind trust, an arrangement used by many politicians to prevent them from knowing their financial interests; the Trump family is already aware of who their overseas partners are and could easily learn about any new ones.<\/p>\n<p>Many foreign governments retain close ties to and even control of companies in their country, including several that already are partnered with the Trump Organization. Any government wanting to seek future influence with President Trump could do so by arranging for a partnership with the Trump Organization, feeding money directly to the family or simply stashing it away inside the company for their use once Trump is out of the White House. This is why, without a permanent departure of the entire Trump family from their company, the prospect of legal bribery by overseas powers seeking to influence American foreign policy, either through existing or future partnerships, will remain a reality throughout a Trump presidency.<\/p>\n<p>Moreover, the identity of every partner cannot be discovered if Trump reverses course and decided to release his taxes. The partnerships are struck with some of the more than 500 entities disclosed in Trump\u2019s financial disclosure forms; each of those entities has its own records that would have to be revealed for a full accounting of all of Trump\u2019s foreign entanglements to be made public.<\/p>\n<p>The problem of overseas conflicts emerges from the nature of Trump\u2019s business in recent years. Much of the public believes Trump is a hugely successful developer, a television personality and a failed casino operator. But his primary business deals for almost a decade have been a quite different endeavor. The GOP nominee is essentially a licensor who leverages his celebrity into streams of cash from partners from all over the world. The business model for Trump\u2019s company started to change around 2007, after he became the star of NBC\u2019s The Apprentice, which boosted his national and international fame. Rather than constructing Trump\u2019s own hotels, office towers and other buildings, much of his business involved striking deals with overseas developers who pay his company for the right to slap his name on their buildings. (The last building constructed by Trump with his name on it is the Trump-SoHo hotel and condominium project, completed in 2007.)<\/p>\n<p>In public statements, Trump and his son Donald Trump Jr. have celebrated their company\u2019s international branding business and announced their intentions to expand it. \u201cThe opportunities for growth are endless, and I look forward to building upon the tremendous success we have enjoyed,\u201d Donald Trump Jr. said in 2013. Trump Jr. has cited prospects in Russia, Ukraine, Vietnam, Thailand, Argentina and other countries.<\/p>\n<p>Source:<\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/www.veteransnewsnow.com\/2016\/09\/14\/how-trump-organizations-foreign-business-ties-could-upend-u-s-national-security\/<\/p>\n\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Kurt Eichenwal, Newsweek If Donald Trump is elected president, will he and his&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28910,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28909"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greeknewsondemand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}