Monday, August 14, 2023

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As GOP attacks Bidens, Rep. Jamie Raskin promises report on ‘foreign government emoluments’ to Trump

Shant Shahrigian, New York Daily News
Sun, August 13, 2023 

Drew Angerer/Getty Images North America/TNS


Amid GOP howls over the Hunter Biden case, lawmakers are scrutinizing former President Donald Trump’s business dealings during his time in office, Rep. Jamie Raskin said Sunday.

The Maryland Democrat promised a new report on cash that foreign governments gave to Trump businesses, though he did not go into detail.

“We’re going to release a report about all of the foreign government emoluments — millions of dollars — we can document that Donald Trump pocketed at the hotels, at the golf courses (and) business deals when he was president and that his family got,” Raskin told ABC’s “This Week.”

The comment came amid a series of questions to Raskin about GOP and federal probes of Hunter Biden. Republicans in Congress have been investigating whether the troubled son inappropriately benefited from his powerful father, among other accusations that remain unproven.

Raskin said his Republican counterparts should look closer to home.

“During the Trump administration, we saw the development of a completely new public philosophy, which is that government is not an instrument of the common good in the public interest,” he said.

While a frequent news subject during the Trump years, the former president’s business dealings with foreign governments drew no legal consequences. In 2021, the Supreme Court ended lawsuits accusing the president of taking illegal payments, saying they were irrelevant since he was out of office.

But Raskin accused Republicans including Rep. James Comer of Kentucky of having a double standard by probing the Bidens while ignoring Trump and his family.

“We have said, let the justice system run its course. They’re not saying that about Donald Trump,” Raskin remarked.

While Trump has been one of the loudest voices accusing the Bidens of corruption, he faces a swath of unprecedented prosecutions himself.

On top of his existing multiple indictments, a Georgia district attorney is reportedly set to present evidence in an election interference case against Trump to a grand jury this week after witnesses give testimony.


Raskin compares Trump White House to Putin’s Kremlin

BY LAUREN SFORZA - 08/13/23
Greg Nash
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) is seen during a House National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs Subcommittee hearing to discuss Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena on Wednesday, July 26, 2023.


Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) on Sunday compared a “public philosophy” he says was developed by former President Trump’s administration to a model similar to that of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“During the Trump administration, we saw the development of a completely new public philosophy, which is that government is not an instrument of the common,” Raskin said on “This Week,” ABC’s Sunday show. “Government is an instrument for private self-enrichment for the guy who gets in, his family, for his private businesses.”

Raskin noted that he does not approve of this model, saying “That’s what Putin is doing.” He called on House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) to conduct an analysis of what the laws should be about moneymaking in government.

Raskin was responding to a series of questions in which he was asked whether foreign business dealings by President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, concerned him at all. He deflected and instead addressed his concerns about former President Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, during the previous administration.How a start-up is using AI to write fundraising emailsGOP sees turnout disaster without Trump

“And I’m concerned, not just about public officials like Donald Trump and Jared Kushner, but even family members who go along for the ride, and I’ve been begging my colleague, Chairman Comer, for us to do a serious analysis of what the laws should be about moneymaking,” he said.

Trump’s business dealings during his time as president had been the subject of investigations by House Democrats. Raskin criticized Republicans for their focus only on the Biden family business dealings and not of the president of their own party. Comer is leading the congressional investigations into Biden family business dealings.

“And we’re gonna release a report about all of the foreign government emoluments — millions of dollars — we can document that Donald Trump pocketed at the hotels at the golf courses to business deals when he was president and that his family got,” Raskin added. “But they’ve not laid a glove on Joe Biden. As president, they haven’t been able to show any criminal corruption on his part — what they’ve got is Hunter Biden.


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