President-elect Donald Trump has revealed acts of self-dealing in a recent filing for the Donald J. Trump Foundation. This is the first time the foundation has admitted to being used in a way that satisfies the interests of Trump, one of his businesses, or someone closely connected to him.
A 2015 IRS filing that was uploaded to GuideStar by the Trump Foundation’s lawyers states that the Trump Corporation, an entity controlled entirely by Trump, contributed $566,370 to the foundation, more than any other donor, notes the Washington Post. Trump Productions, responsible for The Apprentice, also contributed another $50,000. Deep within the filing, the foundation indicates that it transferred income or assets to “a disqualified person” or made those assets or income “available for the benefit or use of a disqualified person.” Below that field, the foundation marked “yes” when asked if the assets or income distributed to said disqualified persons failed to come under the acceptable exceptions and if it had done so in prior years. As the Post points out, it’s not certain if this version of the paperwork is the same version submitted to the IRS.
Over the course of his presidential campaign, the Post reported multiple times that Trump may have been using his foundation in self-beneficial ways. This filing, however, is the first admission from the foundation that it had in fact been self-dealing. The New York Attorney General’s Office is currently looking into Trump’s possible self-dealing over the last 10 years.
Also in the filing, which was uploaded to GuideStar yesterday, as first reported by Fast Company, the foundation disclosed ties to Ukrainian businessman Victor Pinchuk, as well as to several controversial media outlets.
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