Trump Foundation acknowledges violating 'self-dealing' ban
By
ISAAC ARNSDORF
11/22/16 10:56 AM EST
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Donald Trump’s foundation has acknowledged violating a prohibition against using charitable funds to benefit the leaders of the organization or their family members, a practice known as “self-dealing.”
In the charity’s latest
report to the IRS, posted online late Monday, the Donald J. Trump Foundation indicates that it transferred income or assets to someone it wasn’t allowed to, such as Trump or a person or an organization close to him, in 2015 and previous years.
The report does not characterize the nature of any such violation. Spokespeople for Trump and for the foundation did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The admission appears to validate extensive reporting by The Washington Post showing that Trump used foundation money to settle
legal disputes for his companies and to buy a
portrait of himself. The Post
reported earlier on Tuesday about the new IRS filing. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has said he is investigating Trump’s foundation “to make sure it’s complying with the laws governing charities in New York.”
The foundation previously paid an IRS
penalty for impermissibly contributing to the political campaign of Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, who later decided not to pursue an investigation into Trump University. The payment violated a prohibition on tax-exempt charities making political contributions.
Trump and Bondi have both denied the financial contribution had any link to Bondi’s decision not to investigate the tyc00n’s real estate seminar.
Separately, Trump last week
agreed to pay $25 million to settle former students’ claims that Trump University defrauded them.
The 2015 IRS form didn’t specify whether the acts of self-dealing were the ones the Post revealed or others.
The filing also showed two $10,000 grants to Project Veritas, James O’Keefe’s activist group that released undercover videos purporting to show Democratic voter fraud efforts in October. It wasn’t clear whether the foundation made two identical grants or the grant was listed twice.
The foundation also gave $5,000 to the Media Research Center, Brent Bozell’s right-wing watchdog whose website called the national news media “the propaganda arm of the Left.”
The Post revealed a drop-off in Trump’s own contributions to the foundation since 2007. In 2015, the charity received $566,370 from the Trump Corporation and $50,000 from another company at the same address (Trump Tower) called Trump Productions, according to the IRS filing.
The biggest gift, $150,000, came from the London office of the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, the charity of a Ukrainian businessman who has also given to the Clinton Global Initiative and the Tony Blair Faith Foundation. The New York Real Estate Institute gave $10,000, and a man in Mount Vernon, New York, named Lawrence Roman gave $5,000, according to the filing.
