The federal government doesn’t know how much money foreign governments and entities have spent at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, a GSA official testified Tuesday.
WASHINGTON — The federal government does not know how much money foreign governments and entities have spent at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., according to testimony from Emily W. Murphy, head of the General Services Administration, which is in charge of leasing federal buildings. Murphy also said that she did not know if the Trump Organization is preparing to sell its lease to the Old Post Office, the grand building that houses the hotel, to a foreign entity.
“The Trump Organization is violating the law, and the Trump administration is letting them get away with it,” Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., who chaired the hearing, told Yahoo News afterward. “It’s an obvious conflict of interest. The potential transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars into the president’s pocket creates even more legal and ethical issues that the Trump administration is desperate to ignore.
One of the emoluments lawsuits has been filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, or CREW, a government watchdog group that opposes the Trump administration. Tuesday’s hearing did little to allay concerns about potential corruption on Trump’s part, said CREW policy director Jennifer Ahearn.
Among the figures who have turned the Trump Hotel into a kind of clubhouse is Rep. Greg Pence, R-Ind., brother of Vice President Mike Pence. Greg Pence, who has spent some $45,000 at the hotel, happens to be the ranking Republican member of the subcommittee before which Murphy appeared on Tuesday morning, and he used his opening remarks to downplay the significance of the hearing. He suggested that instead of “bashing the president,” the committee should focus on “crumbling infrastructure.
Democrats fear that a government seeking to gain favor with the Trump administration could try to buy the hotel. “Let’s just say that Vladimir Putin or one of his oligarch friends decide to buy the hotel for an outrageous price,” an irate DeFazio said in his opening remarks, referencing the Russian president, for whom Trump has routinely expressed fondness.
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