Former President Donald Trump “tried to convert the presidency into a moneymaking enterprise,” a Democratic congressman fumed Sunday, speaking in the wake of findings that Trump raked in millions from foreign governments during his time in office.
Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland repeated calls for Trump to return $7.8 million in payments from governments and officials of 20 nations including China, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Democrats on the House Oversight Committee detailed the findings in a report unveiled this month.
“Donald Trump did something nobody had ever done before. He tried to convert the presidency into a moneymaking enterprise,” Raskin told MSNBC’s “The Weekend.”
The Democrats’ report, which was launched as their Republican counterparts scrutinized the business dealings of President Biden’s son Hunter, found China alone paid Trump businesses $5,572,548 during the first two years of his presidency.
“The Constitution says that the president or any other federal official cannot accept a present and emolument, which means a payment, in office or title of any kind, whatever, that’s in the Constitution, from a king, a prince, a foreign government without the consent of Congress,” Raskin, the ranking Dem on the House Oversight Committee, said Sunday.
Trump, the front-runner for this year’s Republican presidential nomination, defended his foreign business dealings on Fox News last week, The Washington Post noted.
“If I have a hotel and somebody comes in from China — that’s a small amount of money. But I was doing services for them,” he was quoted as saying.
Raskin on Sunday lashed out at claims by Trump’s sons that the former president didn’t take his official salary of $400,000.
“You’re not supposed to be on the payroll for Saudi monarchs and Chinese Communist bureaucrats,” the pol said. “You’re supposed to be getting paid by the American people.”
