During his time in the White House, Donald Trump boasted that just blocks away, the Trump International Hotel was making tens of millions. Newly revealed federal documents show his claims over the Washington, D.C., hotel were far from the truth.
Trump “provided misleading information about the financial situation of the hotel,” which incurred more than $70 million in losses at the hotel during his presidency, according to the House Oversight Committee.
The committee found Trump reported the hotel earned more than $150 million in income during his presidency, but financial disclosures show the hotel needed a loan of more than $27 million from one of his own holding companies, DJT Holdings. Most of the loan was not paid back and instead turned into capital contributions.
The General Services Administration documents reported by the committee also show preferential treatment the hotel received on a loan from Deutsche Bank, which was not previously disclosed.
The Trump International Hotel received a $170 million construction loan, for which repayments on the principal were set to begin in 2018. According to CNN, however, the terms of the transactions were later revised to allow the payments to be deferred for six years.
Since its controversial opening in 2016 at the site of the Old Post Office building, the Trump International Hotel has been one of the most well-known properties in Trump’s real estate portfolio. The property — which sits less than a mile from the White House — sparked concerns over opportunities for foreign and domestic interests to curry favor with the president.
When Trump took office, he resigned from his companies but put his assets into a trust run by his sons, which CNN noted allowed him to benefit financially. The then-president’s business holdings were the subject of multiple lawsuits and hearings over the Constitution’s emoluments clauses. The GSA’s inspector general said in 2019 the Constitution was “ignored” in scrutiny over the Trump Organization’s lease of the hotel during his presidency.
It was reported last month the Trump Organization was in “advanced talks” on selling the lease. Newmark, which is marketing the ground lease after JLL distanced itself following January’s Capitol riot, was seeking at least $400 million for the lease.
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