Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) demanded former President Donald Trump return the $7.8 million international governments paid to his firm whereas he served as president in a letter launched on Friday.
“I write today to demand that you immediately return to the American people the $7,886,072 that we know you have accepted from foreign governments in violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Foreign Emoluments Clause — a fact you admitted, once again, at a Fox News town hall this week,” Raskin wrote within the letter addressed to Trump.
Trump admitted that international governments paid his Trump Organization tens of millions of {dollars} for lodge stays throughout a Fox News city corridor in Iowa on Wednesday.
“If I have a hotel and somebody comes in from China, that’s a small amount of money and it sounds like a lot of money,” Trump stated. “That’s a small [amount of money], but I was doing services for that.”
After turning into president, Trump refused to divest from his enterprise empire of resorts, actual property, golf programs and resorts and maintained management by way of a revocable belief led by his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump. During his presidency, these companies obtained $7.8 million in funds from international governments, based on a report launched by Raskin and House Oversight Committee Democrats on Jan. 3.
Those funds violated the Constitution’s Foreign Emoluments Clause forbidding officers of the United States from receiving something of worth from a international authorities with out consent from Congress, based on Raskin.
Trump and his sons have justified the funds from international governments like China and Saudi Arabia as easy funds for providers rendered at resorts. They claimed to have donated income obtained from international authorities funds to the U.S. Treasury. This coverage, nonetheless, solely utilized to a few of Trump’s properties and solely a few of the funds made by international governments.
The Emoluments Clause, nonetheless, explicitly forbids receipt of something of worth from international governments — not simply income — as Raskin famous.
“[I]t is hard to imagine a more ludicrous and half-hearted approach to the categorical prohibition in the Constitution than The Trump Organization’s ‘voluntary donation’ policy, which was grossly underinclusive in several other respects,” Raskin writes. “By its own terms, the policy applied only to certain Trump properties, excluded state-controlled entities, and was not subject to any kind of audit or inspection.”
In addition to repaying the complete $7.8 million Trump obtained from international governments to the U.S. Treasury, Raskin referred to as on the previous president and 2024 presidential candidate to “provide Congress with a full accounting of all payments, benefits, or other emoluments you received from foreign governments or their agents, including through the more than 500 entities you own, during your term as president.”
Trump confronted in depth lawsuits whereas president that challenged his receipt of international authorities funds as unconstitutional underneath the emoluments clause. Those circumstances led to 2021 when the Supreme Court declared them moot after he left workplace. Trump falsely claimed that he gained the emoluments circumstances throughout a Fox News city corridor on Wednesday.
Raskin’s letter to Trump demanding he repay his international authorities funds comes as Republicans search to question President Joe Biden for allegedly receiving funds from international governments by way of his son, Hunter Biden. Republicans, nonetheless, haven’t introduced nor discovered any proof that such funds to Biden occurred or exist. Raskin has as a substitute proven that Trump obtained copious funds from international governments, together with $5.5 million from China.
Read the letter in full under.
