Jared Kushner's New Foreign Deals Spark 'Corruption' Accusation

Jared Kushner was accused of "corruption" by Representative Robert Garcia, a California Democrat, after news broke of Kushner's new foreign real estate deals.

Kushner, the son-in-law of former President Donald Trump who was a senior White House official in the Trump administration and worked on policy for the Middle East, posted pictures of "early design images" for his new development projects in Albania and Serbia on X, formerly Twitter, on Friday. The proposed projects include luxury buildings off the coast of Albania and in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia.

"We are very excited," Kushner told The New York Times on Friday. "We have not finalized these deals, so they might not happen, but we have been working hard and are pretty close."

The deals would be made through Kushner's investment firm, Affinity Partners, which he started after he left the White House. The firm received $2 billion from Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF). However, his company told the newspaper it has not yet determined if Saudi funds for the project would be used.

Kushner told the Times that he worked on the new deals with Richard Grenell, who served as acting director of national intelligence in Trump's cabinet from February 2020 to May 2020.

However, the former president's son-in-law has received backlash for the deals.

Garcia wrote on X on Friday: "Jared Kushner is back to brokering major deals with foreign governments per new reports today. We've already exposed his $2 billion investment fund with the Saudis, and we are pushing hard to ensure this grift gets the attention it demands. This is real corruption."

Newsweek reached out to Affinity Partners via online form and Garcia's office via email for comment.

Meanwhile, Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, which tracked business deals it considered conflicts of interest during Trump's presidency, told the Times, "At this point in the election cycle Jared Kushner should freeze any new investment plans."

He added: "This particular investment plan seems to involve the worst of every corrupt tendency of the Trump administration and Trump family."

Trump is the presumed 2024 GOP presidential nominee and will likely face off against President Joe Biden, the Democratic incumbent, again in November.

Kushner rebuked any suggestions that he was getting special treatment because of his governmental ties, telling the Times, "No one is 'giving' me deals."

He said that his deals are in no way connected to Trump and that he was not planning on returning to government if Trump wins the presidency in November.

During the Axios BFD summit in Miami last month, Kushner denied that there was any conflict of interest in with the PIF and dismissed ethical concerns around accepting funds from the Saudi crown prince, calling the country "one of the most prestigious investors in the world."

At the summit, Kushner was asked during a live interview if he believed that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who he has done business with after leaving the White House, was responsible for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Kushner replied: "I know the person who I dealt with. I think he's a visionary leader. I think what he's done in that region is transformational."

Khashoggi, a U.S.-based journalist critical of Saudi Arabia's leadership and bin Salman, was killed in a Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018. A month later, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) concluded with high confidence that the Saudi crown prince had ordered his murder, defying the Saudi leadership's claims that they were not involved in the killing.

Trump, who was president at the time of the murder, denied the findings and blocked the release of an unclassified report identifying anyone implicated in the case.

President Biden Impeachment Probe

As Biden campaigns for reelection, House Republicans continue their impeachment inquiry into the president. Biden has been accused of being involved with and benefiting from his son Hunter Biden's foreign business dealings.

The White House has repeatedly denied that Biden ever had anything to do with his son's dealings and Biden called the impeachment inquiry a "baseless political stunt."

X user @PiperDewn wrote on Friday: "Jared Kushner turned out to be everything the @GOP told us Hunter Biden was..."

"Jared Kushner posts and tags NY Times who then immediately put out an article like the good PR guys they are," X user @Out5p0ken said, adding sarcastically, "But Hunter Biden!"