“Modern-day Christopher Columbus”: Kushner, Ivanka Trump project fuels protests in Albania

[0:00] Welcome to the Weekend Prime Time. [0:02] We got a stark reminder this week that saying you will stand up to Donald Trump's corruption [0:07] and actually standing up to Donald Trump's corruption are two very, very different things. [0:13] The latest example this week happened when Senate Republicans spent nearly 20 hours voting on [0:18] and ultimately passing a $70 billion package to fund Trump's immigration agenda through the rest of his term. [0:26] Not only does that bill boost funding for ICE, but it also leaves that controversial Trump DOJ settlement fund completely untouched. [0:36] That is the $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund that critics worry would be used to pay off Trump allies [0:42] and even January 6th insurrectionists. [0:45] That's the same one that even some Republicans slammed before they ultimately voted for it, of course. [0:51] Senator Tom Tillis called it stupid on stilts. [0:54] Senator Mitch McConnell called it utterly stupid, morally wrong. [0:58] And yet, in the end, they both voted for that bill without any real assurances that the fund was dead. [1:04] What makes this vote even more confusing is the fact that the Trump DOJ lawyers yesterday confirmed in a pair of new court filings [1:12] that the fund is dead, at least for now, something that acting AG Todd Blanche emphasized earlier this week on the Hill. [1:21] We are not moving forward with the fund, period. [1:23] You and Associate Attorney General Woodward signed earlier documents regarding the settlement and this fund. [1:31] Would both of you now sign and release documents reversing the DOJ's position on the fund? [1:39] I'm not. [1:40] We're not moving forward with the fund. [1:42] I'm not sure what that means to sign documents reversing. [1:44] There's nothing to reverse. [1:45] We're not moving forward with the fund. [1:49] Yeah. [1:49] Of course, we should just take their word for it. [1:53] They're good for it. [1:54] They deserve the benefit of the doubt. [1:56] Norms have gone really well. [1:58] Exactly. [1:58] Norms. [1:59] Administration and first term. [2:00] Things not written down. [2:02] Things not written on parchment in the Constitution. [2:05] All of those things going super great. [2:07] I think what's most striking, what's kind of most frustrating for me is the amount of adulation and kudos that some of these lawmakers got when they briefly made those, you know, alliterative criticisms about stupid on stilts and whatnot. [2:24] Like, we have a clip, I think, from Tom Tillis where he says that, of course, he's not going to vote for this legislation. [2:32] Let's play that. [2:35] If this does not get added to the bill, could you support passage? [2:40] No, I'm not going to. [2:41] I'm not going to vote to get off. [2:42] I voted to get on it with the goal of potentially getting an amendment done or supporting some other members' amendment. [2:50] And then, of course, in the middle of the night, he votes to pass it anyway. [2:54] I mean, all signs seem to point to them finding one way to do this or another. [2:58] And Tillis and all these other guys, they're very well aware of that fact. [3:01] Already, I think it's hundreds of former January Sixers have lodged sort of administrative complaints with the DOJ in a bid to get money. [3:09] We know from the reporting that there were efforts from this administration to signal to many of those people that they would get money. [3:15] This was before we even knew about the $1.776 billion fund. [3:20] And so when you hear Blanche say they're not going forward with this fund, that does not mean we are not going forward with a mechanism. [3:26] To get cash into the hands of people who experts believe may use that cash to go purchase weaponry and to prepare to do something like this again in the midterms or 2028. [3:38] Well, and I think more critically, what Trump probably cares about even more, because it's most in his interest, is the audits on himself and his families. [3:46] And that hasn't been struck from any agreement and is still in play accordingly. [3:52] And so talk about a get-out-of-jail-free card. [3:55] If any American is told they don't have to pay taxes and can just operate however they want in this country and gets permission to do so, [4:04] do you think Donald Trump and his family will not fully take advantage of that? [4:07] Yeah, I mean, there is this real question about whether they ever have to pay taxes again. [4:11] It depends on how you read the language of this settlement agreement. [4:14] But on its face, it looks like they at least cannot be audited for past tax returns that the New York Times says that they may have owed— [4:20] Trump himself may have owed $100 million on. [4:23] So that gets written off. [4:24] And then there's the question about what about tax returns, taxes, period, that might have been due in the years ahead. [4:32] Well, speaking of taxes and why he may potentially have any vulnerabilities with that, let me read some of the headlines. [4:37] I guess like over the last couple of weeks, to be honest with you, of just the brazen corruption and shady, questionable behavior by Trump and his family. [4:47] ProPublica reports that the White House intervened to get a $620 million deal for a company tied to Donald Trump Jr. [4:54] The Associated Press, Trump discloses thousands of stock trades, some in companies directly influenced by his policies. [5:00] ABC News, Trump family crypto venture tapped as part of a $2 billion Emirati-backed investment deal. [5:07] And of course, the infamous Air Force plane—sorry, I should say Air Force says the former Qatari 747 that was gifted to Donald Trump, [5:16] or to the U.S. government, I should say, is, I guess, almost done being retrofitted. [5:21] Air Force One will be ready to be used this summer. [5:25] So you can see why, with all of this potential income and gifts coming down the pipeline, [5:32] he certainly does not want the IRS to be able to say, hey, we should look into some of these dealings. [5:39] Yeah, any kind of dealings. [5:40] There is one incredible headline, though, from this past week, Eamon, which is Ivanka Trump. [5:45] Oh, yeah, revealing this very interesting, sort of sketchy island that she, Jared Kushner, and others are working on. [5:54] And for anyone who has not seen this really special video of her reflecting on its creation, take a look at this. [6:01] It's an unbelievable, beautiful, 1,400-hectare private island in the middle of the Mediterranean. [6:10] We were on a friend's boat, and we stopped for a swim. [6:13] Effectively, that's how we found it. [6:14] We swam to the islands. [6:16] We went on a hike, barefoot all the way up to the top, and we were just captivated. [6:22] And it stayed with us ever since. [6:25] And over the course of many years, we developed the opportunity to help realize its potential and transform it, [6:34] but with a lot of restraint and care, because the land is so beautiful. [6:38] I did not know that Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump were like the modern-day Christopher Columbus, [6:46] like going out into discovering islands, just discovering islands, hiking, going into the deep blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea [6:56] where no one has ever gone before to discover this island. [7:01] But they're going to develop its true potential. [7:03] It's just eco-tourism. [7:04] Well, the beautiful thing about that is that the Albanian people have taken to the streets by the thousands [7:12] to protest the idea that the Kushner family and Ivanka Trump or the Trumps [7:17] and all their various investment partners would somehow develop this pristine island. [7:23] And so what's funny enough is that it has triggered and created this, like, political crisis. [7:27] So now, not only are we—that's perhaps, like, our greatest import right now is, like, our own political turmoil [7:33] and our corruption is now being imported—it's being exported to other countries. [7:38] But it's kind of embarrassing that, like, they're pushing back more than America. [7:38] Well, it would be nice if we had similar pushback against, say, Don Jr.'s deal. [7:43] Let's talk about this. [7:44] With his 1789 venture fund, he invests in a company called Vulcan, rare-earth magnets that, granted, our country does need. [7:53] We need to encourage production. [7:54] But suddenly they come into an amazing multimillion-dollar package from DoD to super-turbo-charge their business. [8:04] And the valuation of the company went from the time that Don Jr. invested $200 million to $2 billion. [8:11] Hmm. [8:12] Someone, a White House advisor, pick up the phone. [8:14] Nothing to see here, folks. [8:14] Nothing to see there. [8:15] Just your first son's investment. [8:18] He's just a shrewd investor. [8:19] Look, it was on the wedding registry. [8:22] And so Papa couldn't attend, but he bought him a nice gift. [8:26] So there you go. [8:26] No, but it's honestly the level of corruption. [8:28] And I think the broader point that is being ignored here is why are we not seeing pushback, right? [8:33] It kind of goes back to what you were saying about people like Tom Tillis and others. [8:37] And you see these moments where we get excited. [8:39] I certainly got excited when you see, like, a Republican saying, like, oh, I'm going to block the nomination of Kevin Walsh if this doesn't happen. [8:46] Or you see some people— [8:46] Also Tom Tillis. [8:47] That's what I mean. [8:48] It's like these moments where you're like, is this the moment where some Republican is going to say no and say, like, this is a bridge too far? [8:55] And time and time again, we just are constantly—so there's no oversight from a Republican. [8:59] There's no willingness from Republicans to do it. [9:01] And the Democrats just completely don't have the power or the willingness to fight. [9:05] And sometimes just— [9:06] Well, they're in the minority. [9:08] Yes, I mean, that is the most important part. [9:09] Yeah, they're in the minority. [9:10] But there have been times where some have just gone along with some of the votes and still help for it to get across the finish line, you know. [9:16] Not in these specific deals, but in the broader agenda as opposed to trying to just grind everything to a halt. [9:22] You want to pass—you want more funding for ICE raids? [9:27] You've got to grind that to a halt. [9:29] You've got to find a way to grind it to a halt. [9:31] You can't just be saying, like, well, you know, if the president wants some more money for the funding, we're going to work with him as long as the ICE agents are unmasked or we know their names. [9:38] I mean, like, yeah, those are nice, important things. [9:40] But that doesn't stop people from killing people on the streets of America. [9:43] Well, in this case, they don't need Democratic votes, right? [9:46] And they didn't. [9:47] They still have plenty of money to keep on operating. [9:50] That's also true. [9:51] Well, I mean, one of the reasons I think Trump seems to be successful at kind of, like, calling people's bluff on these things and just sort of bulldozing ahead is also that the public is not—I mean, there are these organized protests that come every couple months via no kings and whatever else. [10:06] But when you watch what's happening in Albania right now, it kind of gave me pause for a moment, wondering why, like, what they're experiencing is sort of a fraction of what we've experienced over the course of the last year. [10:17] And, like, you know, I found myself watching that podcast where Ivanka's talking about just that one island project. [10:25] And I was like, I would like to go back in a time machine and, like, show this to a French peasant in the 1700s because I'm like, that was blow their brains out. [10:33] You know what I mean? [10:33] And I guess I'm just wondering why Americans aren't sometimes reacting more forcefully to the headlines that you read through. [10:40] I think it all kind of blends together. [10:42] You know, Steve Bannon was right about the flood the zone with doo-doo, you know, that, like, there is so—I don't know if I'm allowed to say the real word that he said. [10:49] Whatever. [10:49] That there is so much stuff to keep track of, so much corruption, so much self-aggrandizement, so much potential self-dealing. [10:57] I mean, we've been watching them potentially take down the name of the president from the Kennedy Center. [11:03] Like, that's one of so many different things that if it had happened in isolation, maybe people would be out in the streets. [11:09] You know, people were out in the streets for the Women's March, right, back in 2017, before anything had happened. [11:15] And the Muslim ban at the airport also triggered a lot of protests and backlash. [11:19] Maybe people just feel powerless at this point. [11:21] But they have at least an electoral process coming up, which we're going to talk about next.