'His narcissism always interferes': Jamie Raskin says Trump brags about money from China
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) tore into former President Donald Trump, following the release of a report about Trump taking $8 million from foreign governments.
"Congressman, we played that part where Trump was sort of asked about it at the campaign rally he did in coordination with Fox. He doesn't deny it," said anchor Chris Hayes. "I don't think the facts are in dispute here. I don't think anyone disputes the facts as documented in your report."
"No, he was bragging about it," said Raskin. "His narcissism always interferes with his legal defenses. But he openly embraced it and said he did a lot for that money. And indeed, he did."
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"If you read our report, you will see how he basically killed an investigation in sanctions against ICBC, the Chinese state-owned company that was renting space from him, and paying him lots and lots of money, hundreds of thousands of dollars," Raskin continued. "Everybody knows the way he covered up for the homicidal crown prince of Saudi Arabia, who also was spending hundreds of thousands of dollars a year at Trump's hotels, golf courses, and so on. And of course, the big payoff came later with the $2 billion to his son-in-law, to Jared Kushner."
"But the bottom line is, there's really no defense is out there," said Raskin. "His sons have said a couple things, like, well, he didn't take his federal salary. I'm sorry, but that's all you are allowed to take, $400,000 from American citizens, not from Saudi monarchs and Chinese government bureaucrats. You can't take money from United Arab Emirates and Kuwait and Qatar, and all the countries we enumerate in our report. We're talking about millions of dollars. So we want it back. He's not allowed to keep a dime of it without coming to Congress first. He never came to Congress, and they've been covering up for this for seven years."
"And when we finally got the Supreme Court to rule for us, and then the district court to do in order, we had four months of compliance before [Republican] Chairman [James] Comer shut it down," Raskin added. "At least according to Trump's lawyers, who said he shut it down. We're getting, now, mixed messages on that. Maybe Trump's lawyers lied, in which case Chairman Comer should make it very clear that [Trump's accounting firm] Mazars has to continue to comply. In any event, we know that's $7.8 million that belongs to the American people, and not in Donald Trump's pockets."
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