Who Is Donald Trump?
Donald John Trump is the 45th President of United States of America. On January 20, 2017 Donald Trump took the President's office. Donald John Trump was born on June 14, 1946, in Queens, New York to Mr. Fred Trump and Mrs. Marry Anne Mcleod. Trump is the fourth of five children. His father was a builder and real estate developer. He was famous for the development of middle-income apartments in Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island. His father passed away in 1999. His mother passed away the following year. At the age of 13 he was sent to the New York Military Academy. He was a bright student both in academics and socially. He became student leader in 1964. Trump entered Fordham University in 1964. He transferred to the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania two years later and graduated in 1968 with a degree in economics. During his summer holidays he joined his father's real estate business. He also secured education deferments for the draft for the Vietnam War and ultimately a 1-Y medical deferment after he graduated.
Trump followed his father into a career in real estate development, bringing his grander ambitions to the family business. Trumps business ventures include The Trump Organization, Trump Tower, casinos in Atlantic City and television franchises like The Apprentice and Miss Universe. Trump has business deals with the Javits Center and the Grand Hyatt New York, as well as other real estate ventures in New York City, Florida and Los Angeles. Trump valued his businesses at least $1.37 billion on his 2017 federal financial disclosure form, published by the Office of Government Ethics. Trumps 2018 disclosure form put his revenue for the year at a minimum of $434 million from all sources.
Personal life
In 1997 he married Ivan Trump. She was a fashion model in New York. The couple had three children together: Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka and Eric. They went through a highly publicized divorce that was finalized in 1992. In 1993 Trump married his second wife, Marla Maples, an actress with whom he had been involved for some time and already had a daughter, Tiffany. The couple got divorced in June 1999.
Currently he is married to Melania Trump who is former Slovenian model. She is 23 years younger than Trump. The couple married in 2005 in a highly-publicized and lavish wedding.
TRUMP’S REAL ESTATE CAREER
THE BEGINNING:
Donald Trump began his real estate career at his father’s company, Elizabeth Trump and Son when he was in college. The company focused on middle-class rental housing in the New York City. Trump started his first project with his father Fred Trump. The project was about the attempted turnaround of the troubled Swifton Village apartment complex in Cincinnati, Ohio, which his father had purchased for $5.7 million in 1962 and it was equivalent to $46 million in 2017. In 1968 by the time he graduated, he was receiving the 2019 equivalent of $1,000,000 a year from his father. In 1971 he was made the president of the company and he renamed the company as Trump organization . It was during that time when he moved to Manhattan. In 1978, the city selected his site on the West Side of Manhattan as the location for its Jacob Javits Convention Center as he was the only bidder who had a site ready for the project and in that year he got his first major deal in Manhattan which was the development of the Grand Hyatt Hotel next to Grand Central Terminal.
Development of Trump Tower:
Donald Trump in 1983, completed the development of a 58-story skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan known as the Trump Tower. It was developed by Trump and the Equitable Life Assurance Company, and was designed by architect Der Scutt of Swanke Hayden Connell. The tower houses both the headquarters of the Trump Organization and the primary penthouse condominium residence of Donald Trump and it includes shops, cafés, offices, and residences.
The Phase Of Expansion:
In 1984, the hotel/casino - Harrah's at Trump Plaza in Atlantic City was built by Trump with financing by Holiday Corp. and when it was completed in 1985 it became Trump Castle with his wife Ivana, managing the property. He also acquired a partially completed building in Atlantic City from the Hilton Corporation for $320 million. Apart from this he also acquired the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1985 for $5 million to use it as a winter retreat. In June 1986, he got the contract for the repair of the Central Park's Wollman Rink which was pending since 1980.
In 1988 , Trump acquired the Taj Mahal Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey which was opened in 1990. It became the most expensive casino of that time as it was built at a total cost of $1.1 billion.
Inheritance and acquisitions of property and the operations of Golf Courses:
A vacant ,70-story office building at 40 Wall Street in Manhattan was acquired by Donald Trump in 1996 which became the Trump Building after a complete renovation. He also purchased General Motors building for $878 Million in 1998 along with Conseco. After the death of his father in 1999, Trump and his siblings received equal proportions of his father estate which was valued at $250-300 million. Between the period of 2000-2012 he acquired and constructed many properties. Some of them were Trump World Tower, Trump Palace, Trump Park Avenue, a house in Beverly Hills which he bought for $7 million, 30% stake in the 1290 Avenue of the Americas skyscraper in Manhattan and many others. Apart from this Trump manages and operates about 18 Golf courses and resorts making a revenue of about $382 million according to a report in 2015.
Bankruptcies:
Trump has never filed for personal bankruptcy, but his hotels and casino business declared bankruptcy six times between the period of 1991 to 2009 due to inability to meet required payments of debt with banks, owners of stock and bonds and various small businesses. The bankruptcies were the result of over-leveraged hotel and casino businesses in Atlantic City and New York.
TRUMP IN SPORTS
Before Donald Trump was elected as President of the United States, he was well-known in the golf community. There are 11 Trump Golf-owned properties in the United States, two in Scotland, one in Ireland and one in the United Arab Emirates. The Trump Organization also manages Trump Golf Links at Ferry Point in New York. It also has three golf properties opening soon: one in Dubai and two in Indonesia.
DONALD TRUMP also hosted several boxing matches in Atlantic City at the Trump Plaza, including Mike Tyson's 1988 fight against Michael Spinks, and at one time acted as a financial advisor for Tyson.
In 1989 and 1990, Trump lent his name to the Tour de Trump cycling stage race which was an attempt to create an American equivalent of European races such as the Tour de France. Trump withdrew his sponsorship after the second Tour de Trump in 1990, because his other business ventures were experiencing financial problems Trump submitted a stalking-horse bid on the Buffalo Bills when it came up for sale following Ralph Wilson's death in 2014; he was ultimately outbid, as he expected, and Kim and Terrence Pegula won the auction.
In 1983, Trump's New Jersey Generals became a charter member of the new United States Football League (USFL). Before the inaugural season began in 1983
Before the 1985 season, Trump signed Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Doug Flutie to a $7 million 5-year personal-services contract in(USFL). That made Flutie the highest-paid pro football player at the time, as well as the highest-paid rookie in any professional sport.
The Donald J. Trump Foundation
Donald Trump established the Donald J. Trump Foundation in 1988 as a private foundation. Its initial stated mission was to distribute proceeds from his book, Trump: The Art of the Deal, to charitable causes. As a private foundation, the Trump Foundation is primarily involved in making grants to other nonprofit organizations. Some private foundations donate to achieve targeted goals, a practice often referred to as "strategic philanthropy."
The Trump Foundation collects and spends money in a very unusual manner for a private foundation. In September 2016, 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.
Sources of funds
Through 2015, Trump contributed $5.5 million to the Trump Foundation, including money from his book, while outside donors contributed an additional $9.3 million. His final gift to the foundation was $35,000 in 2008. Many of the outside donors to the foundation have done business with Trump or the Trump Organization. Several philanthropy experts said having a family foundation primarily funded by outside money is unusual.
The top donors to the foundation from 2004 to 2014 were Vince and Linda McMahon of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), or WWE itself. $5 million was donated to the foundation, the donations were reported by the Trump Foundation as coming from the WWE, but the WWE has claimed money came from Vince and Linda McMahon personally. Trump solicited donations in lieu of payment for other services as well. In 2005 Norwegian Cruise Line donated $100,000 in lieu of an appearance fee for Melania Trump.
In 2006, People magazine donated $150,000 for an exclusive right to publish baby photos of Barron Trump. In 2011 Comedy Central donated $400,000 for Trump's appearance in a broadcast comedy roast of himself.
New York Attorney General Investigating
In October 2016, then-Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman ordered the Trump Foundation to cease soliciting donations in New York, after reporting by The Washington Post revealed a host of confirmed and potential legal violations.
Mr. Trump admitted to using the foundation’s money to contribute to political causes. He was also accused of diverting funds to settle disputes involving his businesses, failing to disburse funds to charities to which he said he had given large amounts of money, and publicly claiming credit for donating funds that had actually come from other groups.
After the election, Mr. Trump announced that he would dissolve the foundation to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest; a move the attorney general’s office said would require its approval, given the continuing investigation.
Legal And Ethical Controversies
Improper and extensive political activity
In January 2016, Mr. Trump hosted a nationally televised charity fund-raiser in Des Moines, Iowa, to raise funds for veterans’ organizations. The fund-raiser collected $5.6 million in donations, including $2.8 million directly to the Trump Foundation. But the fund-raiser was planned, organized, financed and directed by campaign staff, according to the attorney general’s petition; and afterward, campaign staff took control of the funds, “directing the timing, amounts and recipients of the grants.”
Accusations of self-dealing
Mr. Trump and the foundation were accused of a wide array of self-dealing transactions, or transactions that were designed to serve him rather than the foundation’s intended beneficiaries.
Among those transactions were several payments of foundation funds to settle legal disputes involving Mr. Trump’s businesses, including a $100,000 payment in 2007 to settle claims against Mar-a-Lago and a $158,000 payment in 2012 to settle claims against the Trump National Golf Club.
The foundation also paid $5,000 in 2013 to a Washington, D.C., charitable organization to feature Trump International Hotels in its charity event programs, and $32,000 in 2015 to a land use organization to cover costs related to a Trump property. In 2014, the foundation paid $10,000 to the Unicorn Children’s Foundation for a painting of Mr. Trump that hung at the Trump National Doral Miami golf resort.
Donation to Pam Bondi
The Trump Foundation also failed to disclose that it had donated $25,000 in 2013 to a candidate for Florida’s attorney general seat, in violation of law that prohibits private foundations from making political contributions. The donation came around the time that Bondi was deciding whether to investigate fraud allegations against Trump University, real estate seminars affiliated with Trump's companies.
Dissolution of foundation.
On December 18, 2018, Underwood announced that the foundation had agreed to shut down under court supervision and distribute its remaining assets to court-approved charities, although the attorney general's office would continue its investigations of and legal actions against the foundation and its directors.
In fall 2019, after Trump admitted to misusing money raised by his foundation to promote his presidential campaign and settle debts, he was ordered to pay $2million in damages, and the foundation was forced to shutter its doors.
TRUMP BEAUTY PAGEANTS
Miss USA, once owned by Donald Trump, is an American beauty pageant held annually since 1952, and a part of the Miss Universe Organization. The winner is assigned a yearlong contract with the organization to travel across the US and sometimes abroad to spread messages and awareness about the chosen causes. Besides that, the winner also gets a cash allowance during her reign, modelling portfolio, beauty products, clothes and footwear, and different services and opportunities by the sponsors.
The Miss USA pageant was owned by Trump from 1996 to 2015. During that time, the winner was given a Trump Place apartment in NYC during her reign, which was to be shared with other pageants’ winners. In 2002, Trump forged a new deal with NBC, and gave them half-ownership of three pageants, and moved them to NBC on an initial five-year contract. In September 2015, WWE/IMG bought the Miss Universe Organization for an undisclosed amount. Trump was forced to sell his holdings after his incendiary comments drove away NBC and Univision. In October 2015, Fox announced it had acquired the US television rights for the pageants. Trump owned the pageant for nearly two decades and came into contact with nearly 4,000 contestants. In financial disclosures for his presidential campaign, Trump said that Miss Universe was worth $5-25 million and had generated $3.4 million in revenue. He also stated that he had earned more than $9.5 million from licensing his name, which could be found on buildings and resorts all around the world, from New York to Dubai, and from Hawaii to Istanbul. His name was also licensed on cologne, home furnishing, and bottled water.
At the end of June 2015, both NBC and Univision announced that they would cut their ties with Donald Trump and Miss Universe Organization. This was done even after the fact that Univision was set to begin a new five-year contract for Spanish broadcast rights of the pageants. They took this action in response to Trump’s remarks calling Mexicans rapists and murderers during the launch of his 2016 campaign. Trump was forced to sell the Miss Universe Organization as a result. At the time the Miss Universe franchise was jointly owned by Trump Organization and NBCUniversal. Soon afterward, the hists, judges, sponsors, and broadcasters dropped out one by one. Trump threatened to sue both NBC and Univision, and on 30th June 2015 Trump sued Univision for defamation and breach of contract for $500 million, claiming that political interference from one of Univision’s owners, prominent Democratic fundraiser Haim Saban, drove the company’s decision to back out of the contract. Other companies had also severed relationships with Donald Trump at that time including Macy’s, Serta, and the PVH Corporation, which all had deals to produce or sell merchandise with the billionaire’s name on them. In September 2015, Trump was forced to sell the pageants to WME, just days after buying his former partner NBCUniversal out. The pageant was finally broadcasted on independent cabler Reelz Channel, where it drew a fraction of the audience that the telecast garnered on NBC. In February 2016, Trump and Univision settled and ended the litigation. The terms of the settlement remain confidential, but it included an agreement for Trump to buy back NBC’s stake in Miss Universe Organization.
Trump was embroiled in another lawsuit with Sheena Monnin, former Miss Pennsylvania, who alleged that the Miss USA was rigged. She was sued by Donald Trump for defamation in December 2012 for $5 million after she claimed that the fraudulent pageant had been fixed. She claimed that former Miss Florida, Karina Brez, said she saw a list of finalists before they were called. However, Brez later changed her story, saying she was just making a passing comment. Monnin attributes this change to fear and pressure from Trump.
TRUMP’S GLOBAL BUSINESS
India
Trump has a range of business interests in india,including a pair of modern towers in Pune and a planned development in Mumbai.
Indonesia
In 2015, the Trump Hotels Collection announced a deal with Indonesian company PT Media Nusantara Citra (MNC)to build a golf course and luxury hotel in West Java,as well as another overlooking the Indian Ocean in BaliTrump paid up to $5 million in royalties for each of the properties.
Ireland
Trump owns a hotel and golf resort in Doonbeg.His organization’s plans to build a long sea wall to protect against erosion on the course’s coastline met opposition from local environmental activists.
Russia
Trump's business strategy included Russia in ventures intended to internationally expand his brand. He transitioned in the mid-2000s from building and investing in real estate to simply licensing his name to hotels, condominiums, and commercial towers. From 2000 to 2010, Trump partnered with a development company headquartered in New York represented by a Russian immigrant, Felix Sater. During this period, they partnered for an assortment of deals that included building Trump towers internationally. For example, in 2005 Sater acted as an agent for building a Trump tower alongside Moscow River with letters of intent in hand and "square footage was being analyzed. In 2007, Trump announces that Trump Vodka will expand its distribution into Russia, his first foray into the Russian market. Trump "Super Premium" Vodka, bottles glazed with 24-karat gold, debuted in 2007 at the Millionaire's Fair in Moscow.It was successful only until sometime in 2009. Trump attempted to create a reality show in St. Petersburg, starring a Russian athlete. However, this was not successful.
Qatar
Trump has stakes in four companies that appear to be tied in business in the desert nation. The country’s state owned carrier, Qatar Airways, has leased an office in Manhattan’s Trump Tower since 2008.
Urugauy
In 2012 Trump licensed his name to a gleaming, cylindrical residential tower in Uruguay’s Punta del Este. At the time it was Trump’s International Realty’s first project in South America.
South Korea
Trump’s name adorns six condominium buildings in Seoul, Busan and Daegu. Dubbed “Trump World,” they were erected by Daewoo, the South Korean corporation, which pays Trump for the use of his name.
Saudi Arabia
shortly after Donald trump became president, Trump registered eight companies that could be related to a development project in Jeddah, Donald trump has old relations with the Saudi oligarch prince Alwaleed bin Talal Alsaudtake, the oligarch took majority control of New York’s Plaza Hotel when Trump faced financial upheaval in the 1990s and also bought a Trump yacht when the President-elect’s Atlantic City casinos were struggling.
Egypt
Trump has positions in two companies that may be related to business in Egypt: Trump Marks Egypt and Trump Marks Egypt LLC.
Panama
In July 2011, Trump unveiled The Trump Ocean Club International Hotel and Tower in Panama City, developed by local partner Newland International Properties Corp. At the time, the 70-story building was the tallest in Latin America.
UAE
Trump has a tangle of business interests in the UAE. His first venture in the country was a branding deal in 2005 to build a hotel with Nakheel, a developer backed by Dubai’s royal family.The project was canceled in 2008 following a corruption and bribery probe into two Nakheel executives.In 2013, Trump struck a branding deal with Damac Properties Dubai Co., to build luxury villas and a golf course.
United Kingdom
Trump owns two golf courses in Scotland: Trump Turnberry, on the rugged Ayrshire coast, and Trump International Golf Links, near Aberdeen.
Turkey
Trump has a licensing deal to use his name on two luxury towers in Istanbul, one commercial and the other residential. Trump also has a licensing deal with Dorya International, a Turkish design company, to manufacture Trump branded furniture.
