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Eric Trump funneled cancer charity money to his businesses, associates: report

Rogue Valley

Rogue Valley

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Eric Trump funneled cancer charity money to his businesses, associates: report

By LAUREN PEARLE and RILEY BEGGIN
Jun 7, 2017

Eric Trump is slamming a Forbes report that alleges his charity, the Eric Trump Foundation, has been funneling donations -- from donors who believed the money was going to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital -- to the Trump Organization by paying high sums for use of Trump properties during fundraisers and re-donating some funds to charities friendly with Trump interests. Forbes reported Tuesday that the Eric Trump Foundation paid the Trump family business hundreds of thousands of dollars over the last seven years for use of one of the organization’s golf courses, funds which he claimed were being donated nearly in full to the children’s cancer charity. "We were able to come up with this concept of raising a lot of money with really no expense and it's because we were incurring the expenses at the assets we were taking on the expenses as Trump. We were using our own facilities," Eric told donors in a promotional video.

According to IRS filings, the Eric Trump Foundation in 2012 spent $59,085 on its annual Golf Invitational fundraiser held at the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, New York -- money that skimmed from donations to St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. Those expenses ballooned to $230,080 in 2013 and to $242,294 in 2014, according to the filings. It is unclear from these tax forms how much of those payments went to the Trump Organization.Forbes reported that in 2011, costs for Eric Trump’s golf tournament fundraiser tripled because his father realized that the organization had not been charging for the event and there were no bills to prove it. The Foundation declined to provide Forbes with an itemized list of expenses for the tournament. Charity experts told Forbes that the amount paid to the Trump Organization for a golf tournament fundraiser for St. Jude’s "defy any reasonable cost." In addition, the Forbes report claims that Eric Trump's charity redirected some donations. More than $500,000 was given by the Eric Trump Foundation to other charities, "many of which were connected to Trump family members or interests," according to Forbes.
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Donald Trump bitched to his son Eric that he wasn't making any money on the annual charity golf outing for the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital which were held at a Trump golf course in New York.

So Eric apparently started making a profit for the Trump Organization on the 'charity' golf outing by skimming from donations while maintaining that all donations went to St. Jude Children's Hospital.

If true, this is some pretty shady shenanigans.
 
Well he learned from one of the best con artists in the business, so it is most likely true.
 
Rogue Valley said:
Eric Trump funneled cancer charity money to his businesses, associates: report


Donald Trump bitched to his son Eric that he wasn't making any money on the annual charity golf outing for the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital which were held at a Trump golf course in New York.

So Eric apparently started making a profit for the Trump Organization on the 'charity' golf outing by skimming from donations while maintaining that all donations went to St. Jude Children's Hospital.

If true, this is some pretty shady shenanigans.
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Wow. Funds meant for charity going to the Trump Organization instead. SAD!
 
shame on ET for stealing charity funds meant for children fighting the BIG C ..............
 
From the report:

"During the past decade, the Eric Trump Foundation has raised over $16.3 million for St. Jude Children’s Research hospital while maintaining an expense ratio of just 12.3 percent," the statement reads. "The Eric Trump Foundation was also responsible for building a $20 million dollar ICU which treats the sickest children anywhere in the world suffering from the most catastrophic terminal illnesses."
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What is the rate to rent a golf course? Asking for a friend.
 
Rogue Valley said:
Eric Trump funneled cancer charity money to his businesses, associates: report


Donald Trump bitched to his son Eric that he wasn't making any money on the annual charity golf outing for the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital which were held at a Trump golf course in New York.

So Eric apparently started making a profit for the Trump Organization on the 'charity' golf outing by skimming from donations while maintaining that all donations went to St. Jude Children's Hospital.

If true, this is some pretty shady shenanigans.
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Perfectly normal for expenses related to a fund raiser to be deducted from the donation and paid out to vendors or lenders. Perfectly normal for a foundation to pay out funds to any charity it wishes. No shenanigans just partisan witch hunting.
 
OpportunityCost said:
From the report:
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When I first started reading this my initial reaction was that it is just overhead. "Skimming" donations is misleading since every charitable organization uses donated funds for overhead, but the sums and locations support the assertion of funneling money to the Trump organization. There is no legitimate reason why Eric should be spending nearly a quarter of a million dollars on a single fundraising event at a Trump venue.
 
One would think that Trump's courses could donate the use of the facility and write it off.

At the very least it looks cheesy.

Cheesy from the son of Cheeto.
 
Napoleon said:
When I first started reading this my initial reaction was that it is just overhead. "Skimming" donations is misleading since every charitable organization uses donated funds for overhead, but the sums and locations support the assertion of funneling money to the Trump organization. There is no legitimate reason why Eric should be spending nearly a quarter of a million dollars on a single fundraising event at a Trump venue.
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The reason is its less than they would have spent holding it somewhere else. At least thats what the report claims. This sounds like SOP for charities, not unique to Trump.

Investigation Of American Red Cross Finances Finds 'Fundamental Concerns' : NPR

But Grassley's office found that 25 percent of donations sent to Haiti — or nearly $125 million — were spent on fundraising and management, a contingency fund and the catchall category the Red Cross calls "program expenses."
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fmw said:
Perfectly normal for expenses related to a fund raiser to be deducted from the donation and paid out to vendors or lenders. Perfectly normal for a foundation to pay out funds to any charity it wishes. No shenanigans just partisan witch hunting.
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Eric Trump told charity donors that ALL donation money would go to St. Judes. At first, this was true. All donations did go to St. Jude. The Trump golf course hosted the charity event for no charges at all. Then Donald Trump bitched that he wasn't making any money on this event so .... Eric began skimming money from the charity donations and funneling them to the Trump Organization. Despite these money diversions, he still told the charity donors that ALL donation money goes to St. Jude Children's Hospital.

No wonder Trump refuses to release his tax returns. This is the sort of sleazy crap he wants to hide.
 
fmw said:
Perfectly normal for expenses related to a fund raiser to be deducted from the donation and paid out to vendors or lenders. Perfectly normal for a foundation to pay out funds to any charity it wishes. No shenanigans just partisan witch hunting.
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It's normal to hire a facility that holds your fund raising events.

It's not normal (or legitimate) to tell donors "we use these facilities 100% free of charge" and then pay for it.

It's not normal to spend $240,000 on a single day fundraiser at a golf course.

It's not normal for the one-day cost to jump from $50,000 to $240,000 over a few years' time.

It's not normal to steer a charity's business to one of your own businesses / a family business.

The attempt to fob this off on partisanship is mildly humorous, as Forbes (which wrote the article) is not exactly a bastion of Democratic journalism.
 
Rogue Valley said:
Eric Trump told charity donors that ALL donation money would go to St. Judes. At first, this was true. All donations did go to St. Jude. The Trump golf course hosted the charity event for no charges at all. Then Donald Trump bitched that he wasn't making any money on this event so .... Eric began skimming money from the charity donations and funneling them to the Trump Organization. Despite these money diversions, he still told the charity donors that ALL donation money goes to St. Jude Children's Hospital.

No wonder Trump refuses to release his tax returns. This is the sort of sleazy crap he wants to hide.
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Outrage that Trump's charity is operating like every other charity on the planet only with more transparency.
 
jonny5 said:
The reason is its less than they would have spent holding it somewhere else. At least thats what the report claims. This sounds like SOP for charities, not unique to Trump.
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I think that explanation strains credulity. I attended the annual Columbus HRC gala over the weekend. It was attended by billionaires, millionaires, our former Governor, City Countil President, and other prominent residents of our State. It was held in the ballroom of the Ohio State student union - which certainly did not cost anywhere near a quarter of a million dollars to book. I would normally consider spending such a gratuitous sum on a single fundraising event to be incompetence, but this is a cut and dry case of deliberately funneling donated money to the Trump organization.
 
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Visbek said:
It's normal to hire a facility that holds your fund raising events.

It's not normal (or legitimate) to tell donors "we use these facilities 100% free of charge" and then pay for it.

It's not normal to spend $240,000 on a single day fundraiser at a golf course.

It's not normal for the one-day cost to jump from $50,000 to $240,000 over a few years' time.

It's not normal to steer a charity's business to one of your own businesses / a family business.

The attempt to fob this off on partisanship is mildly humorous, as Forbes (which wrote the article) is not exactly a bastion of Democratic journalism.
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Completely partisan. Eric Trump isn't even a part of the government.
 
Skeptic Bob said:
They have definitely done some good in the past. But that doesn't justify keeping large amounts of the donations for personal use.
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But we don't know that, because an itemized expense list is not provided. All we know is the total and the donations. shrug
 
Napoleon said:
When I first started reading this my initial reaction was that it is just overhead. "Skimming" donations is misleading since every charitable organization uses donated funds for overhead, but the sums and locations support the assertion of funneling money to the Trump organization. There is no legitimate reason why Eric should be spending nearly a quarter of a million dollars on a single fundraising event at a Trump venue.
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Hmm, I dunno.

Clinton Fundraisers Are Fined $35,000

Paul has contended the event cost more than $1.9 million, though campaign reports at the time put it at about $500,000. As part of the agreement, the cost is put at $1.2 million, with almost $400,000 listed as unreported for the cost of producing the concert and nearly $100,000 unreported for travel and lodging.
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fmw said:
Completely partisan. Eric Trump isn't even a part of the government.
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What the what?

Forbes Magazine investigated and wrote the article. They are center-right. They're a business magazine. Their motto is "The Capitalist Tool." It's operated by Steve Forbes, who ran twice for the Republican nomination for President.

Just because you don't like hearing something, that does not prove the source is biased, or that the information isn't true.
 
Visbek said:
What the what?

Forbes Magazine investigated and wrote the article. They are center-right. They're a business magazine. Their motto is "The Capitalist Tool." It's operated by Steve Forbes, who ran twice for the Republican nomination for President.

Just because you don't like hearing something, that does not prove the source is biased, or that the information isn't true.
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The OP is partisan.
 
fmw said:
Perfectly normal for expenses related to a fund raiser to be deducted from the donation and paid out to vendors or lenders. Perfectly normal for a foundation to pay out funds to any charity it wishes. No shenanigans just partisan witch hunting.
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A better article is the original from Forbes, here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/danale...charity-money-into-his-business/#78fc93016b4a

And the problems are three, really, to start:

1) DJT and Eric have both asserted many, many times that the Trump Org donates the facilities for free - at no charge - so that 100% or nearly so of donations goes to St. Jude's. That's never been true and the bills in later years kept going up, far above what Trump charged other charities.
2) The bills in later years cannot be explained based on any reasonable assumptions. Food and drink donated, entertainment donated, prized donated, etc. And yet the bills kept going up and reached $300k plus. Assuming NONE was donated, still can't get to $300k.
3) At least one year, DJT did a bit of money laundering by taking 100k from outside donations to his foundation, which he gave to Eric's foundation, which then paid Trump Org 142k for "donated" services such as use of the Trump facilities.
 
jonny5 said:
The reason is its less than they would have spent holding it somewhere else. At least thats what the report claims. This sounds like SOP for charities, not unique to Trump.
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No it doesn't. That's false. https://www.forbes.com/sites/danale...charity-money-into-his-business/#78fc93016b4a

Even if the Eric Trump Foundation had to pay the full rate for literally everything, Forbes couldn't come up with a plausible path to $322,000 given the parameters of the annual event (a golf outing for about 200 and dinner for perhaps 400 more).
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And if Eric's foundation needed to pay DJT for use of his facilities, fine, but don't lie about it to your donors, year after year after year and tell them all that is being provided to the foundation at no charge.

It's pretty incredible to take credit for giving away the services, and at the same time charge the charity a PREMIUM, above market cost!
 
reinoe said:
Outrage that Trump's charity is operating like every other charity on the planet only with more transparency.
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And more lies! Don't forget the lies!
 
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