Biographer of former President Donald Trump, David Cay Johnston, wrote in his new book that the kind of business practices in the Trump Org. couldn't exactly happen under the radar if he was the president.
"Maintaining such long-term business relationships required Trump to restrain his grasping instincts," wrote Johnston in The Big Cheat. "And it exposed him to a whole new kind of risk from partners smarter and more devious than he. He could no longer stiff or cheat his business partners and move on to the next victim, which had always been his modus operandi."
Even the promises made about his businesses didn't hold true. Trump said he would put his businesses into a blind trust. He never did. Trump swore he wouldn't have any foreign deals while president. That promise lasted about two weeks, until Eric Trump was discovered to be in the Dominican Republic "at a resort that originally was to bear the Trump name."
"Cap Cana was a massive resort project covering more land than the island of Manhattan," Johnston describes in the book. "Temporary wooden platforms were built so prospective buyers could climb up and see what a magnificent unobstructed view they would have of the turquoise Caribbean waters beneath the cliffs."
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That deal went sideways when the recession hit and all of the promises Trump made to investors were abandoned. Some even told reporters that they were losing their life's savings. But, as Johnston points out, it was the same story as other projects Trump did in Manhattan, Arizona, Florida and Baja California, where investors also never got what they were promised.
It made it strange that Eric Trump would show up when he did in 2017, particularly given the bad blood of the project. It also seemed odd given Trump had promised there would be no new foreign businesses deals. The Trump Org. attorney said that their position still stood. Oddly, Trump included on his financial disclosure a licensing agreement to his name for the DR project that never happened and the jungle has since grown over.
"Global Witness, a nonprofit that exposes global corruption, especially as it relates to land use, sent an undercover investigator to Cap Cana in 2018, after Eric’s visit," Johnston recalls. "Posing as the agent for a wealthy investor, the investigator met with a sales representative who was captured on video. “And then here,” the sales agent says, pointing to a map, 'we’re [going to] have a new development with the Trump Organization of apartments and [a] commercial area.'"
Trump called it all "fake news."
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You can check out further lists of corruption in Johnston's new book, The Big Cheat, which is on sale now.
