Ivanka Trump isn’t the only member of the White House power couple whose private business dealings with China have benefited from her father’s presidency. That’s because her husband Jared Kushner, fellow investor in Trump’s Washington D.C. hotel and senior advisor to the president, is also shaking hands with China. Or at least the members of his family running the Kushner business are, as the Washington Post and others report a recent event held in Beijing offered Chinese investors “golden visas” for a large sum.
Nicole Kushner Meyer, Kushner’s sister, asked investors gathered at the event to “consider investing hundreds of thousands of dollars in a New Jersey luxury apartment complex.” Part of the deal’s appeal, per brochures distributed to potential investors, regarding possible immigration to the United States: “Invest $500,000 and immigrate to the United States.” Yet many of the meeting’s details couldn’t be reported firsthand by the press, according to Reuters, as journalists were banned from the premises by organizers guarding the entries.
Even so, reporters managed to acquire the aforementioned brochure, additional documentation, and several witnesses’ accounts of what was said during the presentation. Especially by Meyer, who was touted as Trump senior advisor Kushner’s sister in promotional materials. The context, per CBS News, was used to encourage Chinese investors to help fund the New Jersey real estate project in exchange for the controversial EB-5 immigrant investor visa program, “which allows permanent U.S. residency for those who finance projects that create a certain amount of jobs.”
Despite what was reportedly said, however, Kushner’s lawyer Blake Roberts denied his involvement. “Mr. Kushner has no involvement in the operation of Kushner Companies and divested his interests in the One Journal Square project,” he said in a statement. “As previously stated, he will recuse from particular matters concerning the EB-5 visa program.”
On Monday, Kushner Companies issued an apology, and a clarification for what Meyer. According to CNN, their statement stressed Meyer’s comments weren’t an “attempt to lure investors,” and that she “wanted to make clear that her brother had stepped away from the company in January and has nothing to do with this project.”
(Via Washington Post, Reuters, CBS News and CNN)