Given the tumult in the Middle East, it makes sense that the first foreign tour of President Donald Trump’s second term would be to the region. The situation in Gaza is dire: Israel plans to “conquer” the territory and displace millions of Palestinians, who are facing famine and renewed military bombardment. The Trump administration may have reached a ceasefire with Houthi rebels in Yemen, who allegedly have promised to stop attacking U.S. ships in the Red Sea, but Israel is still bombing the Iran-backed militia. And the administration is negotiating with Iran itself about the fate of its nuclear program. Trump has sounded an optimistic note about those talks, but should they fail, he has made it clear that the United States could bomb Iranian facilities and possibly trigger a regional war.
But Trump isn’t visiting the Middle East to push for peace or really to do much diplomacy at all. Instead, his visit to the Persian Gulf is, one Arab official told Axios, all about “business, business and business.” Yes, Trump is seeking investment in America: Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who ordered the murder of U.S.-based journalist Jamal Khashoggi during the president’s first term, has already pledged $600 billion. But one increasingly gets the sense that it’s not America’s business that Trump is really there for: It’s his family businesses. This swing through three Gulf states, which kicked off on Monday, is the clearest and most damning instance yet of his approach to governance in his second term, where official business and personal business are fully intertwined.
Trump’s trip was tainted by massive, historic corruption even before it began, when it was revealed that he would accept a “palace in the sky”—a luxury Boeing 747-8 worth $400 million—from Qatar, which he plans on using as Air Force One. “So the fact that the Defense Department is getting a GIFT, FREE OF CHARGE, of a 747 aircraft to replace the 40 year old Air Force One, temporarily, in a very public and transparent transaction, so bothers the Crooked Democrats that they insist we pay, TOP DOLLAR, for the plane,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “The Dems are World Class Losers!!!” But the proposed gift was criticized not only by Democrats but also by Republicans, including Senator Rand Paul, podcaster Ben Shapiro, and far-right loon Laura Loomer. Plus, the Defense Department isn’t really getting the gift: Trump has indicated he plans on transferring the jet to his presidential library foundation at the end of his term, which likely means he can keep using it after he leaves office.
There are no indications that the jet—which Qatari officials have said has not been officially gifted—is part of an explicit quid pro quo. That hardly matters, though. Qatar is buying favor with the president in an act of deep and brazen corruption. Trump wants to be treated as a king, and Qatar is playing ball. Will Qatar be rewarded by favorable treatment by the U.S. government for as long as Trump is president? Of course it will. This is exactly how Trump has always wanted to govern—via personal relationships, in which foreign leaders and business magnates grovel before him. This is exactly how he’s governing during his second term.
Trump’s businesses have extensive ties in the Gulf, particularly Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar (as well as nearby Azerbaijan). It would be shocking if Trump did not discuss his own business interests while encouraging investment in the U.S.—indeed, it is quite clear that he sees no difference between the two. For Trump, the business of America and the Trump family business are one and the same.
Trump’s visit to the Gulf is following in the footsteps of his sons, Eric and Donald Jr. The pair have been jaunting across the region drumming up business, and in recent weeks “announced new overseas business deals involving billions of dollars, including a luxury hotel in Dubai, a high-end residential tower in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and a new golf course and villa complex in Qatar,” according to The New York Times. But the pair are most notable for introducing cryptocurrency to their family’s business portfolio. They are currently pushing to take public American Bitcoin, a crypto firm they co-founded, which would allow investors to directly finance a company with close ties to the president.
Since assuming office, Trump has backed pro-crypto legislation and shuttered a Department of Justice unit devoted to investigating its use in fraud, money laundering, tax-avoidance schemes, and other crimes—all actions that benefit his own increasing financial stake in the industry. Most outrageously, he has repeatedly pushed crypto as a means of buying direct access to him. $Trump, a meme coin launched three days before his inauguration, has recently soared, thanks to the president inviting 220 of its top investors to dine with him in what he called the “most EXCLUSIVE INVITATION in the world.” That ploy led to a windfall—investors spent nearly $150 million buying the president’s meme coin—in a weeks-long sale that ended on Monday. Not all of the invitees are known, but they include a number of prominent cryptocurrency investors, including Justin Sun, a major Trump donor who saw a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation close after he spent $75 million on $WLFI, a separate meme coin peddled by the president during the 2024 campaign.
Sun, who was born in China and is currently based in Hong Kong, is just one of many foreigners cashing in on the ability to influence the president. As with the Qatari jet, the absence of a quid pro quo is immaterial. These people are buying access so they can lobby the president on crypto regulation. The real estate and bitcoin ventures being pursued by the presidents’ children vastly exceed—by a tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, at least—the lobbying work done by President Joe Biden’s son Hunter, which Trump and many others on the right spent years insisting was a massive scandal.
For Trump, this is what being president is all about: He is entitled to a massive windfall and a luxury jet because he is in charge of the world’s most powerful country. He explained the jet as a simple perk of being the commander in chief of the American military. “I think it was a gesture because of the fact that we help, have helped, and continue to, we will continue to, all of those countries: Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and others,” he said on Monday. A $400 million jet he will use when he leaves office is simply a perk of the job—as are lucrative real estate and cryptocurrency deals. Trump calls it a gesture, but it’s clearly something more.
What is happening now is unquestionably the biggest corruption scandal in American history. There are signs that the Democrats are waking up to it. The party recently blocked a bill to regulate stablecoin, one form of cryptocurrency, and are demanding that it include requirements barring elected officials from owning or promoting stablecoin ventures. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, meanwhile, pledged to put a hold on all Department of Justice nominees until “we get more answers” about the Qatari jet. In the meantime, Trump will be jetting around the Middle East making deals for himself and his children—and maybe, just maybe, for the country too.
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