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Trump Owes Tens Of $Millions To The Bank Of China. The Loan Will Be Due In His 2nd Term

Trump Owes Tens Of $Millions To The Bank Of China. The Loan Will Be Due In His 2nd Term

Bank of China
Leading Republicans want to distract attention from Trump’s pandemic response and make China pay for U.S. COVID stimulus. Trump owes $millions to Bank Of China. The loan will be due in his 2nd term if he gets one. President Donald Trump talks about coal during a fundraiser in Fargo, N.D., Sept. 7, 2018. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Leading Republicans who want to distract attention from the president’s pandemic response and help him get reelected are joining Donald Trump in blaming China for the spread of coronavirus.

They’re calling for Trump to cancel a $1 trillion-plus U.S. debt to the Bank Of China as part of a “pandemic tariff.” But Trump’s business owes the same bank money. It’s complicating his re-election campaign messaging, Politico reported.

In 2012, Trump’s real estate partner refinanced a New York building for almost $1 billion, making it one of the most expensive in Trump’s portfolio. The debt included $211 million from the state-owned Bank of China — its first loan of this kind in the U.S. — which matures in the middle of what could be Trump’s second term, financial records show.

Trump owns a 30 percent stake in the property — a 43-story skyscraper that spans an entire city block at 1290 Avenue of the Americas. Trump’s ownership of the building got some attention before and after his 2016 campaign but the loan’s due date in 2022 has largely gone unnoticed, Politico reported.

Trump and his campaign have increased their rhetoric on the same bank’s role in a $1.5 billion deal announced in 2013 by partners of Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, while the former VP was in office. They label Biden “Beijing Biden” and say Biden is “soft on China”. China will “own” the U.S. if Biden wins, Trump says.

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), is one of the loudest China critics. In recent TV appearances, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee called for canceling the U.S. debt with China, slapping a “pandemic tariff” on Chinese goods and imposing unspecified sanctions on Chinese officials, Washington Post reported.

“China needs to pay,” Graham told Fox News. He accuses the Chinese government of “gross negligence and willful deception” in its handling of the outbreak.

Missouri’s Republican attorney general this week sued Chinese authorities in federal court, hoping to make China pay billions of dollars spent on economic relief during the U.S. pandemic.

“The Republican campaign aims to capitalize on growing public distrust of China and to draw voters’ attention to Beijing’s alleged responsibility for the deepening recession, rather than criticism of the president’s pandemic response,” David J. Lynch wrote for the Washington Post.

Trump’s attempt to portray former Vice President Biden as a pawn of the Chinese government looks lame and hypocritical. The president’s debt to the Chinese bank could complicate his efforts to tie Hunter Biden to so-called illicit financial dealings in China.

“Trump’s recent criticisms of China have been muddied by his own mixed messaging as well as by his numerous financial ties to the country,” Politico reported. “Those connections extend far beyond the Avenue of the Americas loan: Chinese state-owned companies are constructing two luxury Trump developments in United Arab Emirates and Indonesia. The president and his daughter Ivanka Trump, a White House adviser, have been awarded trademarks by China’s government. And his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has courted Chinese investors in at least one other real estate deal.”

Listen to GHOGH with Jamarlin Martin | Episode 70: Jamarlin Martin Jamarlin goes solo to discuss the COVID-19 crisis. He talks about the failed leadership of Trump, Andrew Cuomo, CDC Director Robert Redfield, Surgeon General Jerome Adams, and New York Mayor de Blasio.

Trump denies he has any conflict with China. “He is highly conflicted with respect to China,” said Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), a member of the House Oversight Committee.

The main investor of 1290 Avenue of the Americas is Vornado Realty Trust, which owns 70 percent.

With its $211 million loan, Bank of China became the first country to enter the U.S. securitization market, according to a 2013 Wall Street Journal article. Vornado’s federal financial disclosures show that it — and Trump still owe money from the 2012 deal.

https://twitter.com/JenOLoughlin/status/1253729984625045505?s=20