After sharing a mega-post of January Washington Post articles a week ago, I thought it would be worthwhile to go further back in time and share some Post articles from December (in reality, the last few articles in the queue for 2016 were all WaPo, so may as well close it out in one shot). End of year articles after the jump.
Showing posts with label charity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label charity. Show all posts
Monday, February 6, 2017
Wednesday, January 4, 2017
[Special] The Washington Post's David Fahrenthold
During the craziness of the 2016 election cycle, one of the most prominent reporters to emerge in the public's mind was David Fahrenthold. Certainly, while I was posting snippets and links as part of this blog, he and Newsweeks' Kurt Eichenwald were names I saw with frequency, often sharing breaking news that was the highlight of the week.
Fahrenthold shared his thoughts about his coverage of Donald Trump, beginning with the president-elect's failure to comply with his own promises to donate to charity and winding into deeper and deeper absurdities, as can only come with the full Trump experience. The article shows how Fahrenthold used a mix of classic newspaper investigation and modern social media tools to get to the answers. It was almost as fun as watching Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman play Fahrenthold's predecessors, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, in All The President's Men (highly recommended film, of course).
Fehrenthold gives me hope for the next four years. I hope that there are journalists like him who will continue to dig and look for the truth in an administration that will try to obfuscate and misdirect. The story can be read here.
Fahrenthold shared his thoughts about his coverage of Donald Trump, beginning with the president-elect's failure to comply with his own promises to donate to charity and winding into deeper and deeper absurdities, as can only come with the full Trump experience. The article shows how Fahrenthold used a mix of classic newspaper investigation and modern social media tools to get to the answers. It was almost as fun as watching Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman play Fahrenthold's predecessors, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, in All The President's Men (highly recommended film, of course).
Fehrenthold gives me hope for the next four years. I hope that there are journalists like him who will continue to dig and look for the truth in an administration that will try to obfuscate and misdirect. The story can be read here.
Sunday, November 6, 2016
[Special] New York Times: Why Donald Trump Should Not Be President
By Times Editorial Board:
Despite his towering properties, Mr. Trump has a record rife with bankruptcies and sketchy ventures like Trump University, which authorities are investigating after numerous complaints of fraud. His name has been chiseled off his failed casinos in Atlantic City.
Mr. Trump’s brazen refusal to disclose his tax returns — as Mrs. Clinton and other nominees for decades have done — should sharpen voter wariness of his business and charitable operations. Disclosure would undoubtedly raise numerous red flags; the public record already indicates that in at least some years he made full use of available loopholes and paid no taxes.
Mr. Trump has been opaque about his questionable global investments in Russia and elsewhere, which could present conflicts of interest as president, particularly if his business interests are left in the hands of his children, as he intends. Investigations have found self-dealing. He notably tapped $258,000 in donors’ money from his charitable foundation to settle lawsuits involving his for-profit businesses, according to The Washington Post.
* * *
He used the shameful “birther” campaign against President Obama’s legitimacy as a wedge for his candidacy. But then he opportunistically denied his own record, trolling for undecided voters by conceding that Mr. Obama was a born American. In the process he tried to smear Mrs. Clinton as the instigator of the birther canard and then fled reporters’ questions.
Since his campaign began, NBC News has tabulated that Mr. Trump has made 117 distinct policy shifts on 20 major issues, including three contradictory views on abortion in one eight-hour stretch. As reporters try to pin down his contradictions, Mr. Trump has mocked them at his rallies. He said he would “loosen” libel laws to make it easier to sue news organizations that displease him.
* * *
His plan for cutting the national debt was far from a confidence builder: He said he might try to persuade creditors to accept less than the government owed. This fanciful notion, imported from Mr. Trump’s debt-steeped real estate world, would undermine faith in the government and the stability of global financial markets. His tax-cut plan has been no less alarming. It was initially estimated to cost $10 trillion in tax revenue, then, after revisions, maybe $3 trillion, by one adviser’s estimate. There is no credible indication of how this would be paid for — only assurances that those in the upper brackets will be favored.
The Full Story (September 25, 2016)
Bonus - New York Times: Hillary Clinton For President:
Mrs. Clinton and her team have produced detailed proposals on crime, policing and race relations, debt-free college and small-business incentives, climate change and affordable broadband. Most of these proposals would benefit from further elaboration on how to pay for them, beyond taxing the wealthiest Americans. They would also depend on passage by Congress.
That means that, to enact her agenda, Mrs. Clinton would need to find common ground with a destabilized Republican Party, whose unifying goal in Congress would be to discredit her. Despite her political scars, she has shown an unusual capacity to reach across the aisle.
When Mrs. Clinton was sworn in as a senator from New York in 2001, Republican leaders warned their caucus not to do anything that might make her look good. Yet as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, she earned the respect of Republicans like Senator John McCain with her determination to master intricate military matters.
Her most lasting achievements as a senator include a federal fund for long-term health monitoring of 9/11 first responders, an expansion of military benefits to cover reservists and the National Guard, and a law requiring drug companies to improve the safety of their medications for children.
Below the radar, she fought for money for farmers, hospitals, small businesses and environmental projects. Her vote in favor of the Iraq war is a black mark, but to her credit, she has explained her thinking rather than trying to rewrite that history.
The Full Story (September 25, 2016)
Despite his towering properties, Mr. Trump has a record rife with bankruptcies and sketchy ventures like Trump University, which authorities are investigating after numerous complaints of fraud. His name has been chiseled off his failed casinos in Atlantic City.
Mr. Trump’s brazen refusal to disclose his tax returns — as Mrs. Clinton and other nominees for decades have done — should sharpen voter wariness of his business and charitable operations. Disclosure would undoubtedly raise numerous red flags; the public record already indicates that in at least some years he made full use of available loopholes and paid no taxes.
Mr. Trump has been opaque about his questionable global investments in Russia and elsewhere, which could present conflicts of interest as president, particularly if his business interests are left in the hands of his children, as he intends. Investigations have found self-dealing. He notably tapped $258,000 in donors’ money from his charitable foundation to settle lawsuits involving his for-profit businesses, according to The Washington Post.
* * *
He used the shameful “birther” campaign against President Obama’s legitimacy as a wedge for his candidacy. But then he opportunistically denied his own record, trolling for undecided voters by conceding that Mr. Obama was a born American. In the process he tried to smear Mrs. Clinton as the instigator of the birther canard and then fled reporters’ questions.
Since his campaign began, NBC News has tabulated that Mr. Trump has made 117 distinct policy shifts on 20 major issues, including three contradictory views on abortion in one eight-hour stretch. As reporters try to pin down his contradictions, Mr. Trump has mocked them at his rallies. He said he would “loosen” libel laws to make it easier to sue news organizations that displease him.
* * *
His plan for cutting the national debt was far from a confidence builder: He said he might try to persuade creditors to accept less than the government owed. This fanciful notion, imported from Mr. Trump’s debt-steeped real estate world, would undermine faith in the government and the stability of global financial markets. His tax-cut plan has been no less alarming. It was initially estimated to cost $10 trillion in tax revenue, then, after revisions, maybe $3 trillion, by one adviser’s estimate. There is no credible indication of how this would be paid for — only assurances that those in the upper brackets will be favored.
The Full Story (September 25, 2016)
Bonus - New York Times: Hillary Clinton For President:
Mrs. Clinton and her team have produced detailed proposals on crime, policing and race relations, debt-free college and small-business incentives, climate change and affordable broadband. Most of these proposals would benefit from further elaboration on how to pay for them, beyond taxing the wealthiest Americans. They would also depend on passage by Congress.
That means that, to enact her agenda, Mrs. Clinton would need to find common ground with a destabilized Republican Party, whose unifying goal in Congress would be to discredit her. Despite her political scars, she has shown an unusual capacity to reach across the aisle.
When Mrs. Clinton was sworn in as a senator from New York in 2001, Republican leaders warned their caucus not to do anything that might make her look good. Yet as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, she earned the respect of Republicans like Senator John McCain with her determination to master intricate military matters.
Her most lasting achievements as a senator include a federal fund for long-term health monitoring of 9/11 first responders, an expansion of military benefits to cover reservists and the National Guard, and a law requiring drug companies to improve the safety of their medications for children.
Below the radar, she fought for money for farmers, hospitals, small businesses and environmental projects. Her vote in favor of the Iraq war is a black mark, but to her credit, she has explained her thinking rather than trying to rewrite that history.
The Full Story (September 25, 2016)
Thursday, November 3, 2016
Washington Post: Trump Boasts About his Philanthropy, but His Giving Falls Short of his Words
In the fall of 1996, a charity called the Association to Benefit Children held a ribbon-cutting in Manhattan for a new nursery school serving children with AIDS. The bold-faced names took seats up front.
There was then-Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani (R) and former mayor David Dinkins (D). TV stars Frank and Kathie Lee Gifford, who were major donors. And there was a seat saved for Steven Fisher, a developer who had given generously to build the nursery.
Then, all of a sudden, there was Donald Trump.
“Nobody knew he was coming,” said Abigail Disney, another donor sitting on the dais. “There’s this kind of ruckus at the door, and I don’t know what was going on, and in comes Donald Trump. [He] just gets up on the podium and sits down.”
Trump was not a major donor. He was not a donor, period. He’d never given a dollar to the nursery or the Association to Benefit Children, according to Gretchen Buchenholz, the charity’s executive director then and now.
But now he was sitting in Fisher’s seat, next to Giuliani.
“Frank Gifford turned to me and said, ‘Why is he here?’ ” Buchenholz recalled recently. By then, the ceremony had begun. There was nothing to do.
“Just sing past it,” she recalled Gifford telling her.
So they warbled into the first song on the program, “This Little Light of Mine,” alongside Trump and a chorus of children — with a photographer snapping photos, and Trump looking for all the world like an honored donor to the cause.
Afterward, Disney and Buchenholz recalled, Trump left without offering an explanation. Or a donation. Fisher was stuck in the audience. The charity spent months trying to repair its relationship with him.
“I mean, what’s wrong with you, man?” Disney recalled thinking of Trump, when it was over.
Editor's Note: Ms. Disney is the granddaughter of Roy Oliver Disney, the co-founder of Walt Disney Productions (along with his brother, Walter Elias Disney)
Thursday, October 20, 2016
Washington Post: Trump Foundation Ordered to Stop Fundraising by N.Y. Attorney General’s Office
The New York attorney general disclosed Monday that it ordered Donald Trump’s personal charity to cease fundraising immediately after determining that the foundation was violating state law by soliciting donations without proper authorization.
The message was conveyed in a “notice of violation” sent Friday to the Donald J. Trump Foundation, of which Trump is president.
The night before, The Washington Post reported that Trump’s foundation — which has subsisted entirely on other people’s donations since 2008 — had failed to register with the state as a charity soliciting money.
Because of that, Trump’s foundation had avoided rigorous annual audits that New York state requires of charities that seek the public’s money. Those audits would have asked, among other things, if the foundation’s money had been used to benefit Trump or one of his businesses.
Monday, October 17, 2016
Talking Points Memo: Big League Trouble - Trump Faces New Questions About His Charity Finances
Seth Perlman of Perlman and Perlman, a New York City firm that specializes in nonprofit law, said that accusations that Trump was illegally directing fees to his charity are tough to prove and not totally unheard of in the non-profit world.
"It becomes really troubling, however, if he was diverting or pushing fees to a nonprofit and using those fees to benefit himself. That becomes a much more serious problem," Perlman said.
One former IRS regulator told TPM that, taken all together, the financial dealings surrounding the foundation would have forced him to “give some serious thought” to recommending a criminal investigation into the foundation’s practices.
“Once you see a pattern of that kind of egregious nature, you start to think if whether there’s an appropriate criminal referral there,” said Philip Hackney, a Louisiana State University Law Center professor who previously served in the IRS’ Office of the Chief Counsel as a senior technician reviewer for exempt organizations.
Washington Post: Trump Directed $2.3 Million Owed to Him to His Tax-Exempt Foundation Instead
Donald Trump’s charitable foundation has received approximately $2.3 million from companies that owed money to Trump or one of his businesses but were instructed to pay Trump’s tax-exempt foundation instead, according to people familiar with the transactions.
In cases where he diverted his own income to his foundation, tax experts said, Trump would still likely be required to pay taxes on the income. Trump has refused to release his personal tax returns. His campaign said he paid income tax on one of the donations, but did not respond to questions about the others.
* * *
“This is so bizarre, this laundry list of issues,” said Marc Owens, the longtime head of the Internal Revenue Service office that oversees nonprofit organizations who is now in private practice. “It’s the first time I’ve ever seen this, and I’ve been doing this for 25 years in the IRS, and 40 years total.”
The laws governing the diversion of income into a foundation were written, in part, to stop charity leaders from funneling income that should be taxed into a charity and then using that money to benefit themselves. Such violations can bring monetary penalties, the loss of tax-exempt status, and even criminal charges in extreme cases.
Thursday, October 13, 2016
Washington Post: Trump Used $258,000 From His Charity To Settle Legal Problems
In 2010, a man named Martin Greenberg hit a hole-in-one on the 13th hole while playing in a charity golf tournament at Trump’s course in Westchester County, N.Y.
Greenberg won a $1 million prize. Briefly.
Later, Greenberg was told that he had won nothing. The prize’s rules required that the shot had to go 150 yards. But Trump’s course had allegedly made the hole too short.
Greenberg sued.
Eventually, court papers show, Trump’s golf course signed off on a settlement that required it to make a donation to a group of Greenberg’s choosing. Then, on the day that the parties informed the court they had settled their case, a $158,000 donation was sent to the Martin Greenberg Foundation.
That money came from the Trump Foundation, according to the tax filings of both Trump’s and Greenberg’s foundations.
Greenberg’s foundation reported getting nothing that year from Trump personally or from his golf club.
The Full Story (September 20, 2016)
Saturday, October 8, 2016
[Special] The Smoking Gun: Trump [Is] The Least Charitable Billionaire
From 1990 through 2009, Trump has personally donated a total of just $3.7 million to his foundation, which was incorporated in 1987. In fact, the billionaire is not even the largest contributor to his own charitable organization.
Tax returns show that World Wrestling Entertainment has given Trump’s foundation a total of $5 million in return for the developer’s assistance in working a couple of televised angles along with WWE boss Vince McMahon. The WWE gave Trump’s foundation $4 million in 2007 for his help in promoting that year’s WrestleMania festivities, and another $1 million in 2009, when Trump (pictured below with McMahon) pretended to purchase part of the WWE empire.
The Full Story (April 12, 2011)
Friday, October 7, 2016
U.S. News & World Report: A Tale of Two Foundations
By Robert Schlesinger:
Take his foundation, which he started in 1987 with the purpose of giving away the profits from his book, "The Art of the Deal." But, thanks to the tireless reporting of The Washington Post's David Fahrenthold, we know that in the last 10 years it's become more of a pass-through for other people's gifts, with Trump slapping his name on them. The candidate and his surrogates have claimed that he is a generous philanthropist on the order of tens of millions of dollars, but Fahrenthold has spent months trying to track down any evidence of this with little success (his running Twitter chronicle of his efforts is high entertainment). He found that, per the most recent public records, Trump hasn't given any of his own money to his foundation since 2008 and between then and his becoming the GOP nominee (when high-profile acts of charity became politically beneficial) he seems to have given only one charitable donation from his own pocket to anyone – a gift of less than $10,000 to the Police Athletic League of New York in 2009 (but that "may also be a bookkeeping error").
Trump's foundation hasn't gone dormant: "Since then, all of the donations have been other people's money – an arrangement that experts say is almost unheard of for a family foundation," Fahrenthold reported last weekend. "Trump then takes that money and does with it as he pleases. In many cases, he passes it on to other charities, which often are under the impression that it is Trump's own money." Suckers.
He doesn't give all the money to charity, mind you. He famously bought a six-foot painting of himself and a football autographed by Tim Tebow. And – more to the point for someone who claims expertise in the corrupting ways of modern politics – the foundation gave an especially well-timed $25,000 contribution to a political group connected to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (who had solicited the donation from Trump) when her office was reviewing a case the New York attorney general had brought against the risible Trump University – an investigation the office subsequently elected not to pursue. Not for nothing, a charitable foundation like Trump's can't make political contributions (he's paid a penalty to the IRS over the matter), and team Trump claims that the check coming from there rather than his personal account was the result of a clerical mix-up.
Take his foundation, which he started in 1987 with the purpose of giving away the profits from his book, "The Art of the Deal." But, thanks to the tireless reporting of The Washington Post's David Fahrenthold, we know that in the last 10 years it's become more of a pass-through for other people's gifts, with Trump slapping his name on them. The candidate and his surrogates have claimed that he is a generous philanthropist on the order of tens of millions of dollars, but Fahrenthold has spent months trying to track down any evidence of this with little success (his running Twitter chronicle of his efforts is high entertainment). He found that, per the most recent public records, Trump hasn't given any of his own money to his foundation since 2008 and between then and his becoming the GOP nominee (when high-profile acts of charity became politically beneficial) he seems to have given only one charitable donation from his own pocket to anyone – a gift of less than $10,000 to the Police Athletic League of New York in 2009 (but that "may also be a bookkeeping error").
Trump's foundation hasn't gone dormant: "Since then, all of the donations have been other people's money – an arrangement that experts say is almost unheard of for a family foundation," Fahrenthold reported last weekend. "Trump then takes that money and does with it as he pleases. In many cases, he passes it on to other charities, which often are under the impression that it is Trump's own money." Suckers.
He doesn't give all the money to charity, mind you. He famously bought a six-foot painting of himself and a football autographed by Tim Tebow. And – more to the point for someone who claims expertise in the corrupting ways of modern politics – the foundation gave an especially well-timed $25,000 contribution to a political group connected to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (who had solicited the donation from Trump) when her office was reviewing a case the New York attorney general had brought against the risible Trump University – an investigation the office subsequently elected not to pursue. Not for nothing, a charitable foundation like Trump's can't make political contributions (he's paid a penalty to the IRS over the matter), and team Trump claims that the check coming from there rather than his personal account was the result of a clerical mix-up.
Washington Post: How Donald Trump Retooled His Charity to Spend Other People’s Money
The Donald J. Trump Foundation is not like other charities. An investigation of the foundation — including examinations of 17 years of tax filings and interviews with more than 200 individuals or groups listed as donors or beneficiaries — found that it collects and spends money in a very unusual manner.
For one thing, nearly all of its money comes from people other than Trump. In tax records, the last gift from Trump was in 2008. Since then, all of the donations have been other people’s money — an arrangement that experts say is almost unheard of for a family foundation.
Trump then takes that money and generally does with it as he pleases. In many cases, he passes it on to other charities, which often are under the impression that it is Trump’s own money.
In two cases, he has used money from his charity to buy himself a gift. In one of those cases — not previously reported — Trump spent $20,000 of money earmarked for charitable purposes to buy a six-foot-tall painting of himself.
Money from the Trump Foundation has also been used for political purposes, which is against the law. The Washington Post reported this month that Trump paid a penalty this year to the Internal Revenue Service for a 2013 donation in which the foundation gave $25,000 to a campaign group affiliated with Florida Attorney General Pamela Bondi (R).
Thursday, October 6, 2016
Yahoo: Trump Charity Gave $100,000 to David Bossie’s Citizens United That Helped Fund Lawsuit Against Mogul’s Foe
The size and timing of the donation to the Citizens United Foundation, an arm of the sprawling conservative network run by David Bossie, who is now Trump’s deputy campaign manager, could raise fresh questions about whether Trump has used his tax-exempt charity to further political and personal causes.
Tuesday, October 4, 2016
Washington Post: Trump Pays IRS a Penalty for His Foundation Violating Rules With Gift to Aid Florida Attorney General
By David A. Fahrenthold:
Donald Trump paid the IRS a $2,500 penalty this year, an official at Trump's company said, after it was revealed that Trump's charitable foundation had violated tax laws by giving a political contribution to a campaign group connected to Florida's attorney general.
The improper donation, a $25,000 gift from the Donald J. Trump Foundation, was made in 2013. At the time, Attorney General Pam Bondi was considering whether to investigate fraud allegations against Trump University. She decided not to pursue the case.
Earlier this year, The Washington Post and a liberal watchdog group raised new questions about the three-year-old gift. The watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, filed a complaint with the IRS — noting that, as a registered nonprofit, the Trump Foundation was not allowed to make political donations.
The Post reported another error, which had the effect of obscuring the political gift from the IRS.
In that year's tax filings, The Post reported, the Trump Foundation did not notify the IRS of this political donation. Instead, Trump's foundation listed a donation — also for $25,000 — to a Kansas charity with a name similar to that of Bondi's political group. In fact, Trump's foundation had not given the Kansas group any money.
The Full Story (September 1, 2016)
Donald Trump paid the IRS a $2,500 penalty this year, an official at Trump's company said, after it was revealed that Trump's charitable foundation had violated tax laws by giving a political contribution to a campaign group connected to Florida's attorney general.
The improper donation, a $25,000 gift from the Donald J. Trump Foundation, was made in 2013. At the time, Attorney General Pam Bondi was considering whether to investigate fraud allegations against Trump University. She decided not to pursue the case.
Earlier this year, The Washington Post and a liberal watchdog group raised new questions about the three-year-old gift. The watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, filed a complaint with the IRS — noting that, as a registered nonprofit, the Trump Foundation was not allowed to make political donations.
The Post reported another error, which had the effect of obscuring the political gift from the IRS.
In that year's tax filings, The Post reported, the Trump Foundation did not notify the IRS of this political donation. Instead, Trump's foundation listed a donation — also for $25,000 — to a Kansas charity with a name similar to that of Bondi's political group. In fact, Trump's foundation had not given the Kansas group any money.
The Full Story (September 1, 2016)
Sunday, October 2, 2016
[Special] Editorial: Donald Trump's Tax Scandal
You may have seen that the New York Times dropped a bombshell on Saturday. If you missed it, allow me to share. In an article called Trump Tax Records Obtained by The Times Reveal He Could Have Avoided Paying Taxes for Nearly Two Decades, written by David Barstow, Susanne Craig and Megan Twohey, the Times leads off with this:
Donald J. Trump declared a $916 million loss on his 1995 income tax returns, a tax deduction so substantial it could have allowed him to legally avoid paying any federal income taxes for up to 18 years, records obtained by The New York Times show.
The 1995 tax records, never before disclosed, reveal the extraordinary tax benefits that Mr. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, derived from the financial wreckage he left behind in the early 1990s through mismanagement of three Atlantic City casinos, his ill-fated foray into the airline business and his ill-timed purchase of the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.
Tax experts hired by The Times to analyze Mr. Trump’s 1995 records said that tax rules especially advantageous to wealthy filers would have allowed Mr. Trump to use his $916 million loss to cancel out an equivalent amount of taxable income over an 18-year period.
While the idea of a millionaire or billionaire going nearly two decades without paying taxes would leave a bad taste in the mouth of anyone but the most strident Libertarian or Trump supporter, it may be more than just gaming the system ("that makes me smart," Trump quipped in response to Hillary Clinton's speculation that maybe Trump "didn't pay any federal income tax"). In fact, there might be something inherently dishonest, and possibly fraudulent, about what Trump has done.Donald J. Trump declared a $916 million loss on his 1995 income tax returns, a tax deduction so substantial it could have allowed him to legally avoid paying any federal income taxes for up to 18 years, records obtained by The New York Times show.
The 1995 tax records, never before disclosed, reveal the extraordinary tax benefits that Mr. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, derived from the financial wreckage he left behind in the early 1990s through mismanagement of three Atlantic City casinos, his ill-fated foray into the airline business and his ill-timed purchase of the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.
Tax experts hired by The Times to analyze Mr. Trump’s 1995 records said that tax rules especially advantageous to wealthy filers would have allowed Mr. Trump to use his $916 million loss to cancel out an equivalent amount of taxable income over an 18-year period.
Saturday, October 1, 2016
[Special] Washington Post: Trump Promised Millions to Charity. We Found Less Than $10,000 Over 7 Years.
By David A. Fahrenthold:
In May, under pressure from the news media, Donald Trump made good on a pledge he made four months earlier: He gave $1 million to a nonprofit group helping veterans’ families.
Before that, however, when was the last time that Trump had given any of his own money to a charity?
If Trump stands by his promises, such donations should be occurring all the time. In the 15 years prior to the veterans donation, Trump promised to donate earnings from a wide variety of his moneymaking enterprises: “The Apprentice.” Trump Vodka. Trump University. A book. Another book. If he had honored all those pledges, Trump’s gifts to charity would have topped $8.5 million.
But in the 15 years prior to the veterans’ gift, public records show that Trump donated about $2.8 million through a foundation set up to give his money away — less than a third of the pledged amount — and nothing since 2009. Records show Trump has given nothing to his foundation since 2008.
The Full Story (June 28, 2016)
In May, under pressure from the news media, Donald Trump made good on a pledge he made four months earlier: He gave $1 million to a nonprofit group helping veterans’ families.
Before that, however, when was the last time that Trump had given any of his own money to a charity?
If Trump stands by his promises, such donations should be occurring all the time. In the 15 years prior to the veterans donation, Trump promised to donate earnings from a wide variety of his moneymaking enterprises: “The Apprentice.” Trump Vodka. Trump University. A book. Another book. If he had honored all those pledges, Trump’s gifts to charity would have topped $8.5 million.
But in the 15 years prior to the veterans’ gift, public records show that Trump donated about $2.8 million through a foundation set up to give his money away — less than a third of the pledged amount — and nothing since 2009. Records show Trump has given nothing to his foundation since 2008.
The Full Story (June 28, 2016)
Wednesday, September 14, 2016
ThinkProgress: How Much Is Donald Trump Worth? An Examination Of The Evidence
Tax records also show that Trump hasn’t given any money to the Donald J. Trump Foundation, a charity he controls but is funded by a number of donors, since 2008. Before that time, he donated only a third of what he had pledged to the foundation. In fact, between 1988 and 2014, Trump gave just a little over $5 million to his foundation, according to BuzzFeed, less than other outside donors. In seven of those years he gave nothing, and in the years between 1991 and 1996 he never gave more than $60,000.
Certainly Trump is under no obligation to give any of his money to charity, no matter how much he might have. But the dissembling around his donations is just one more elision of the truth about his financials.
The Full Story (July 21, 2016)
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