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“The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better.”
That is what “Secretary of War” Pete Hegseth said last Friday about CNN. David Ellison is the son of Trump-supporting billionaire Larry Ellison, who financed the transaction.
The Ellisons’ pending purchase of CNN is only one of many ways that the Trump administration is distorting the media landscape. In a social media post this weekend, Donald Trump highlighted the many ways he is “RESHAPING THE MEDIA” — including the ouster of Stephen Colbert at CBS, the defunding of PBS, and the political weaponization of the FCC.
As today’s piece illustrates, Popular Information bucks this trend. We continue to call out lies, root out corruption, and follow the money.
This perilous moment demands we redouble our efforts and accelerate our growth. You can support this work by upgrading to a paid subscription.
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After Donald Trump won the presidency in 2024, Jared Kushner, his son-in-law, dismissed concerns that his private equity firm would be a vehicle to buy foreign influence.
In December 2024, Kushner said that he “preemptively” raised $1.5 billion earlier that year. The $1.5 billion came from Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund and Lunate, an investment fund linked to the UAE government.
The influx of cash, Kushner said, would allow his firm “to avoid any conflicts” and ensure “we don’t have to raise capital for the next four years.” Kushner made the comments on the December 20, 2024, edition of “Invest Like The Best,” a podcast hosted by Patrick O’Shaughnessy.
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Kushner’s claim that he would not raise additional money during Trump’s presidency to avoid conflicts turned out to be a lie.
On Friday, the New York Times reported that Kushner “has spoken with potential investors in recent weeks about raising $5 billion or more for Affinity Partners.” Kushner’s team has “already met with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund [PIF].” PIF, Kushner’s biggest client, invested $2 billion with Affinity Partners in 2021. According to the report, Kushner is also seeking additional funds from Qatar and the UAE.
Kushner reportedly tried to drum up new investments while at the World Economic Forum in Davos as part of the official Trump administration delegation.
Kushner is seeking billions in additional funding from the Saudi government as he serves as one of Trump’s top negotiators with Iran. Notably, “Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman [MBS] made multiple private phone calls to Trump” in February, advocating a U.S. attack,” according to reporting in the Washington Post. Last week, Trump said Kushner was one of a handful of top advisers who convinced him to launch major combat operations in Iran. According to CNN, the UAE was also lobbying the Trump administration to strike Iran.
After leaving the White House in 2021 and quickly accepting billions from PIF, Kushner acted as a de facto foreign policy advisor to Saudi Arabia. According to a Reuters report, Kushner advised MBS on “U.S.-Saudi diplomatic negotiations involving Israel…multiple times.” Since Trump’s second inauguration, Kushner has resumed his role as one of his father-in-law’s most important foreign policy advisors. Kushner has been one of the administration’s top diplomats for nearly every major foreign policy issue — from the war in Ukraine to Gaza to Iran.
Kushner’s deep involvement with the Trump administration’s foreign policy also breaks a pledge he made before Trump’s second term.
In February 2024, at an event hosted by Axios, Kushner was asked whether accepting billions in investments from Middle Eastern governments would make it “very difficult… to do any sort of foreign policy work” in a second Trump administration.
“I’m an investor now,” Kushner replied. “I served in government, and I think my track record is pretty impeccable. Now I’m a private investor.” Axios titled the video, “Jared Kushner tells Axios he will not join Trump’s administration.”
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During the December 2024 podcast with O’Shaughnessy, Kushner presented himself as law-abiding and scrupulously ethical. At the same time, Kushner insisted his critics were ignorant people who did not understand how business is done. “I’m not going to allow people like the media or these ethics experts, who quite frankly don’t have real jobs and get paid to try to find potential conflicts that don’t exist, to change what we think and what we’re going to do,” Kushner said.
Kushner’s dual role and the Constitution
Is it permissible for Kushner to hold a key position in the Trump administration while simultaneously accepting tens of millions in fees from foreign governments? Not according to the Foreign Emoluments Clause of the Constitution, which prohibits someone “holding any Office of Profit or Trust” from the federal government from accepting “any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Princ