Trump’s $2 billion income is ‘unprecedented’ among US presidents

In 1933, from Franklin D. In the modern era, starting with Roosevelt’s presidency, several presidents have had relatives who wanted to profit from their connections to the White House. Jimmy Carter’s brother introduced the beer brand. While Joe Biden was serving as Vice President, his son Hunter Biden received money from a Ukrainian energy company.

But historians say those past examples pale in comparison to the gains Trump and his family have made since returning to office.

“That’s the big difference between Trump and his family and other presidents,” Perry said. “It’s not illegal to hand over cash in office, but it’s unethical. Most (past) presidents didn’t want to do that.”

In the year Before his first term in office in 2017, Trump took control of his family business, the Trump Organization, for his grown children. But the move broke with precedent set by past presidents because Trump has not based his business interests on traditional blind trusts or shied away from real estate holdings and other investments.

Trump took similar steps before his second term. The Trump Organization has said it will not be involved in the company’s day-to-day operations, serving as president before his second inauguration. Eric Trump said at the time that the Trump Organization would follow “strong ethical standards” during the president’s second term.

Still, Trump has made a number of moves in the White House that benefit his businesses and other top administration officials.

Four months after World Liberty Financial launched its own digital currency last July, Trump signed legislation backing the stablecoin. The organization The financial disclosures put Trump at more than $500 million by 2025, according to the report.

Last October, Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the founder of the cryptocurrency firm Binance. The move comes as Trump praised the crypto industry during his first months in office, after previously dismissing it as a “disaster waiting to happen.”

Trump’s family business and some of his closest associates have profited in other industries beyond cryptocurrency since his return to the White House.

Last year, the New York Times reported that Trump had struck a deal with Kazakhstan’s president that would give an American company the chance to acquire a crucial mining project in the country. Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. later took a minority stake in a company involved in the mine. Cantor Fitzgerald, an investment firm run by the sons of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, also worked on the deal.

On Wednesday, Trump said he was not involved in his family’s business dealings, attributing his gains in office to stock market gains.

“I don’t go into my personal money, we have funds that manage my money,” Trump told reporters. “I made a lot of money before I was president, and they invested my money, and I didn’t talk to them.”

Ethics watchdogs have argued that Trump’s profits from cryptocurrency are particularly problematic.

“It’s definitely a conflict of interest,” Richard Painter, the former chief White House ethics lawyer under George W. Bush, told the BBC. “It’s a very, very sad situation for the American people to see their president making so much money out of the presidency.