Donald John Trump
Donald John Trump
(born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and
current president of the United States.
Before entering politics, he was
a businessman and television personality.
Donald John Trump
(born June 14, 1946) is
an American politician,
media personality,
and businessman who served
as the 45th president of the United States
from 2017 to 2021.
Trump was born and raised in Queens, a borough of New York City, and received a bachelor’s degree in economics from the Wharton School. He took charge of his family’s real-estate business in 1971, renamed it The Trump Organization, and expanded its operations from Queens and Brooklyn into Manhattan. The company built or renovated skyscrapers, hotels, casinos, and golf courses. Trump later started various side ventures, mostly by licensing his name. He produced and hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series, from 2003 to 2015. As of 2020, Forbes estimated his net worth to be $2.1 billion.
Trump entered the 2016 presidential race as a Republican and defeated 16 other candidates in the primaries. His political positions have been described as populist, protectionist, and nationalist. Despite not being favored in most forecasts, he was elected over Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, while still losing the popular vote. He became the oldest first-term U.S. president,[b] and the first without prior military or government service. His election and policies have sparked numerous protests. Trump has made many false or misleading statements during his campaign and presidency. The statements have been documented by fact-checkers, and the media have widely described the phenomenon as unprecedented in American politics. Many of his comments and actions have been characterized as racially charged or racist.
During his presidency, Trump ordered a travel ban on citizens from several Muslim-majority countries, citing security concerns; after legal challenges, the Supreme Court upheld the policy’s third revision. He enacted a tax-cut package for individuals and businesses, rescinding the individual health insurance mandate penalty. He appointed Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. In foreign policy, Trump has pursued an America First agenda, withdrawing the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade negotiations, the Paris Agreement on climate change, and the Iran nuclear deal. During increased tensions with Iran, he ordered the killing of Iranian general Qasem Soleimani.
He imposed import tariffs triggering a trade war with China, recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and withdrew U.S. troops from northern Syria to avoid Turkey’s offensive on American-allied Kurds. Trump met three times with North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un, but talks on denuclearization broke down in 2019.
A special counsel investigation led by Robert Mueller found that Trump and his campaign welcomed and encouraged Russian foreign interference in the 2016 presidential election under the belief that it would be politically advantageous, but did not find sufficient evidence to press charges of criminal conspiracy or coordination with Russia. Mueller also investigated Trump for obstruction of justice, and his report neither indicted nor exonerated Trump on that count. A 2019 House of Representatives impeachment inquiry found that Trump solicited foreign interference in the 2020 U.S. presidential election from Ukraine to help his re-election bid and then obstructed the inquiry itself. The House impeached Trump on December 18, 2019, for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The Senate acquitted him of both charges on February 5, 2020.
Trump’s father, Fred, was born in 1905 in the Bronx. After Fred’s father Friedrich died in the Spanish flu pandemic in 1918,[16] Fred started working with his mother in real estate when he was 15. Their company, “E. Trump & Son”, founded in 1923, was active in the New York boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn, building and selling thousands of houses, barracks, and apartments. In spite of his German ancestry, Fred claimed to be Swedish amid the anti-German sentiment sparked by World War II, continuing to assert this even after the war. Donald Trump also used to claim Swedish heritage until 1990. Trump’s mother Mary Anne MacLeod was born in Scotland. Fred and Mary were married in 1936 and raised their family in Queens. Trump grew up with three elder siblings – Maryanne, Fred Jr., and Elizabeth – and younger brother Robert.
In 1977, Trump married Czech model Ivana Zelníčková.They have three children, Donald Jr. (born 1977), Ivanka (born 1981), and Eric (born 1984), and ten grandchildren.Ivana became a naturalized United States citizen in 1988. The couple divorced in 1992, following Trump’s affair with actress Marla Maples.Maples and Trump married in 1993 and had one daughter, Tiffany (born 1993). They were divorced in 1999, and Tiffany was raised by Marla in California. In 2005, Trump married Slovenian model Melania Knauss. They have one son, Barron (born 2006). Melania gained U.S. citizenship in 2006.
Wealth
In 1982, Trump was listed on the initial Forbes list of wealthy individuals as having a share of his family’s estimated $200 million net worth. His financial losses in the 1980s caused him to be dropped from the list between 1990 and 1995. In its 2020 billionaires ranking, Forbes estimated Trump’s net worth at $2.1 billion[a] (1,001st in the world, 275th in the U.S.) making him one of the richest politicians in American history and the first billionaire American president. During the three years since Trump announced his presidential run in 2015, Forbes estimated his net worth declined 31% and his ranking fell 138 spots. When he filed mandatory financial disclosure forms with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) in July 2015, Trump claimed a net worth of about $10 billion;[60] however FEC figures cannot corroborate this estimate because they only show each of his largest buildings as being worth over $50 million, yielding total assets worth more than $1.4 billion and debt over $265 million. Trump said in a 2007 deposition, “My net worth fluctuates, and it goes up and down with markets and with attitudes and with feelings, even my own feelings.”
Journalist Jonathan Greenberg reported in April 2018 that Trump, using a pseudonym “John Barron”, called him in 1984 to falsely assert that he owned “in excess of ninety percent” of the Trump family’s business, in an effort to secure a higher ranking on the Forbes 400 list of wealthy Americans. Greenberg also wrote that Forbes had vastly overestimated Trump’s wealth and wrongly included him on the Forbes 400 rankings of 1982, 1983, and 1984.
Trump has often said he began his career with “a small loan of one million dollars” from his father, and that he had to pay it back with interest. In October 2018, The New York Times reported that Trump “was a millionaire by age 8”, borrowed at least $60 million from his father, largely failed to reimburse him, and had received $413 million (adjusted for inflation) from his father’s business empire over his lifetime. According to the report, Trump and his family committed tax fraud, which a lawyer for Trump denied. The tax department of New York says it is “vigorously pursuing all appropriate avenues of investigation” into it. Analyses by The Economist and The Washington Post have concluded that Trump’s investments underperformed the stock market. Forbes estimated in October 2018 that the value of Trump’s personal brand licensing business had declined by 88% since 2015, to $3 million.
Trump’s tax returns from 1985 to 1994 show net losses totaling $1.17 billion over the ten-year period, in contrast to his claims about his financial health and business abilities. The New York Times reported that “year after year, Mr. Trump appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual American taxpayer”, and Trump’s “core business losses in 1990 and 1991 – more than $250 million each year – were more than double those of the nearest taxpayers in the I.R.S. information for those years”. In 1995 his reported losses were $915.7 million.
📌Investigations
Further information:
Timeline of investigations into Trump and Russia (transition, January–June 2017, July–December 2017, January–June 2018, July–December 2018, 2019, and 2020–2021)
The Crossfire Hurricane FBI investigation into possible links between Russia and the Trump campaign was launched in mid-2016 during the campaign season. Since he assumed the presidency, Trump has been the subject of increasing Justice Department and congressional scrutiny, with investigations covering his election campaign, transition and inauguration, actions taken during his presidency, along with his private businesses, personal taxes, and charitable foundation.
The New York Times reported in May 2019 that there were 29 open investigations of Trump, including ten federal criminal investigations, eight state and local investigations, and eleven Congressional investigations.
Hush payments
Main article: Stormy Daniels–Donald
Trump scandal
See also: Legal affairs of Donald Trump § Payments related to alleged affairs, and Karen McDougal § Alleged affair with Donald Trump
American Media, Inc. (AMI) paid $150,000 to Playboy model Karen McDougal in August 2016, and Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen paid $130,000 to adult film actress Stormy Daniels in October 2016. Both women were paid for non-disclosure agreements regarding their alleged affairs with Trump between 2006 and 2007. Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to breaking campaign finance laws, saying he had arranged both payments at the direction of Trump in order to influence the presidential election. AMI admitted paying McDougal to prevent publication of stories that might damage Trump’s electoral chances. Trump denied the affairs, and claimed he was not aware of Cohen’s payment to Daniels, but reimbursed him in 2017.
Federal prosecutors asserted that Trump had been involved in discussions regarding non-disclosure payments as early as 2014. Court documents showed that the FBI believed Trump was directly involved in the payment to Daniels, based on calls he had with Cohen in October 2016. In July 2019, a federal judge disclosed that prosecutors had stated in a court filing that they had closed the investigation, but days later the Manhattan District Attorney subpoenaed the Trump Organization and AMI for records related to the hush payments and in August subpoenaed eight years of tax returns for Trump and the Trump Organization.
Russian interference
Main article: Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections
See also: Links between Trump associates and Russian officials, Steele dossier, and Trump-Ukraine scandal
In January 2017, American intelligence agencies – the CIA, the FBI, and the NSA, represented by the Director of National Intelligence – jointly stated with “high confidence” that the Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election to favor the election of Trump. In March 2017, FBI Director James Comey told Congress that “the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. That includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government, and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts.”
The connections between Trump associates and Russia have been widely reported by the press.
One of Trump’s campaign managers, Paul Manafort, had worked from December 2004 until February 2010 to help pro-Russian politician Viktor Yanukovych win the Ukrainian presidency.
Other Trump associates, including former National Security Advisor Michael T. Flynn and political consultant Roger Stone, have been connected to Russian officials.
Russian agents were overheard during the campaign saying they could use Manafort and Flynn to influence Trump. Members of Trump’s campaign and later his White House staff, particularly Flynn, were in contact with Russian officials both before and after the November election. On December 29, 2016, Flynn talked with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak about sanctions that had been imposed the same day; Flynn later resigned in the midst of controversy over whether he misled Pence. The Washington Post reported that Trump told Kislyak and Sergei Lavrov in May 2017 that he was unconcerned about Russian interference in U.S. elections.
Trump and his allies have promoted a conspiracy theory that Ukraine, rather than Russia, interfered in the 2016 election – which has also been promoted by Russia in an effort to frame Ukraine. After the Democratic National Committee was hacked, Trump firstly claimed that it withheld “its server” from the FBI (in actuality there were more than 140 servers, of which digital copies were given to the FBI); secondly claimed that CrowdStrike, the company which investigated the servers, was Ukraine-based and Ukrainian-owned (in actuality, CrowdStrike is U.S.-based, with the largest owners being American companies); and thirdly claimed that “the server” was hidden in Ukraine. Members of the Trump administration have spoken out against the conspiracy theories.
Special counsel investigation
Main articles: Special Counsel investigation (2017–2019) and Mueller Report
On May 17, 2017, former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller, a former director of the FBI, to serve as special counsel for the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) investigating “any links and/or coordination between Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump, and any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation”, thus taking over the existing “Crossfire Hurricane” FBI investigation into the matter. The special counsel also investigated whether Trump’s dismissal of James Comey as FBI director constituted obstruction of justice, and possible campaign ties to other national governments.
Trump repeatedly denied any collusion between his campaign and the Russian government. Mueller also investigated the Trump campaign’s possible ties to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Qatar, Israel, and China.
Trump sought to fire Mueller on several occasions – in June 2017, December 2017, and April 2018 – and close the investigation, but backed down after his staff objected or after changing his mind.He bemoaned the recusal of his first Attorney General Jeff Sessions regarding Russia matters, and believed Sessions should have stopped the investigation.
On March 22, 2019, Mueller concluded his investigation and gave his report to Attorney General William Barr. On March 24, Barr sent a four-page letter to Congress summarizing the “principal conclusions” in the report. He quoted Mueller as stating “while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.” Barr further wrote that he and Rosenstein did not see sufficient evidence to prove obstruction of justice.
Trump interpreted Mueller’s report as a “complete exoneration”, a phrase he repeated multiple times in the ensuing weeks. Mueller privately complained to Barr on March 27 that his summary did not accurately reflect what the report said, and some legal analysts called the Barr letter misleading.
A redacted version of the report was released to the public on April 18, 2019. The first volume found that Russia interfered to favor Trump’s candidacy and hinder Clinton’s. Despite “numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign”, the prevailing evidence “did not establish” that Trump campaign members conspired or coordinated with Russian interference. The report states that Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election was illegal and occurred “in sweeping and systematic fashion”, and it details how Trump and his campaign welcomed and encouraged foreign interference believing they would politically benefit.
The second volume of the Mueller Report dealt with possible obstruction of justice by Trump. The report did not exonerate Trump of obstruction inasmuch as investigators were not confident of his innocence after examining his intent and actions. Investigators decided they could not “apply an approach that could potentially result in a judgment that the President committed crimes”, as they could not indict a sitting president per an Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) opinion, and would not accuse him of a crime when he cannot clear his name in court. The report concluded that Congress, having the authority to take action against a president for wrongdoing, “may apply the obstruction laws”. Congress subsequently launched an impeachment inquiry following the Trump–Ukraine scandal, albeit it ultimately did not press charges related to the Mueller investigation.
Associates
See also: Criminal charges brought in the Special Counsel investigation (2017–2019)
On August 21, 2018, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was convicted on eight felony counts of false tax filing and bank fraud. Trump said he felt very badly for Manafort and praised him for resisting the pressure to make a deal with prosecutors, saying “Such respect for a brave man!” According to Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney, Trump had sought advice about pardoning Manafort but was counseled against it.
On November 29, Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about Trump’s 2016 attempts to reach a deal with Russia to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. Cohen said he had made the false statements on behalf of Trump, who was identified as “Individual-1” in the court documents.
The five Trump associates who have pleaded guilty or have been convicted in Mueller’s investigation or related cases include Paul Manafort, deputy campaign manager Rick Gates, foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos, Michael Flynn, and Michael Cohen. On January 25, 2019, Trump adviser Roger Stone was arrested at his home in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and indicted on seven criminal charges. He was later convicted and sentenced to three years and four months in prison.
2019 congressional investigation
In March 2019, the House Judiciary Committee launched a broad investigation of Trump for possible obstruction of justice, corruption, and abuse of power. Committee chairman Jerrold Nadler sent letters demanding documents to 81 individuals and organizations associated with Trump’s presidency, business, and private life, saying it is “very clear that the president obstructed justice”. Three other committee chairmen wrote the White House and State Department requesting details of Trump’s communications with Putin, including any efforts to conceal the content of those communications. The White House refused to comply, asserting that presidential communications with foreign leaders are protected and confidential.
From: Encyclopedia
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