Eli Stokols
Appearances
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
I'm Eli Stokols. I'm a White House and foreign policy correspondent at Politico.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, he hinted that this would be his first big trip hours after taking the oath of office.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
doing a lot of business in this region. And so just in the last couple weeks, Eric Trump, he was in Doha, and the Trump Corporation is building several real estate ventures out there. They're looking at a Trump International Hotel project in Dubai. That's what brought Eric out there.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
There is another Trump-branded beachside golf and luxury villa project in Qatar that is a multi-billion dollar project. And so these are things that are bringing The family, a lot of money in licensing and managing fees, you know, slapping the Trump name on the side of a building.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
These are also projects that have drawn a lot of investment from various entities in the region that have very close ties to these governments.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
Yes. Not directly. not immediately, but this money is enriching his corporation, right? He did not put any of these things in a blind trust or put up a firewall between his business interests and his work in government in his first term or in his second. And he has said, well, my sons are running the company. I don't really have anything to do with it.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
But yeah, there is, I mean, to even say there's a thin line might be overstating it because You know, we know how Trump operates, and he's talking to his sons. He's talking to these people. He loves doing deals.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
And whether those are side deals, whether they're related to real estate or cryptocurrency, whatever, or whether they're more in the sort of government space, I know we're going to talk about the possible Qatari 747 gift to Trump.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
Those are all sort of benefiting Trump. And ultimately, the Trump family, the Trump Corporation, they are making this money and clearly benefiting from the fact that their father is president of the United States and someone that a lot of these countries that are willing to conduct foreign policy on almost exclusively financial, transactional terms, they are more than willing to play ball.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
And that is benefiting the Trump family and the Trump Corporation.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
Yeah, I mean, as conservatives have pointed out, you know, critics would be wise to remember the Statue of Liberty, pretty large in size, was a gift from France. To the city of New York? That sits in New York Harbor, right? This is a bit different. — Qatar has decided that one way to curry favor with this president is to float just giving the U.S.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
government, giving President Trump a 747 jet, a tricked-out, double-decker, $400 million Boeing jet. and that he would use it as Air Force One for the duration of this term. And Trump says this term only, it would go, it would be mothballed after and go to his presidential library, even though there's actually no plans for a Trump presidential library yet. And all these things are very,
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
you know, murky. But yeah, that's pretty unusual. And it has raised a ton of eyebrows, not just among Democrats or sort of ethical watchdogs, but even among Republicans who say, well, we're going to take an Air Force One donated from a foreign country in the Middle East, and we're just going to use it. That sounds off to a lot of people.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
I mean, that is not typically what has driven foreign policy by presidents prior. That's been sort of an additional thing, not the main thing. Trump gave a speech in Riyadh on Tuesday to the investor conference there that was basically saying, This region is great because of all the stuff you build and all the money that's here.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
And we just want to do deals and we're not going to come here and lecture you about values. And so for someone who's pretty value agnostic like Trump, this is a perfect place to come and conduct this very transactional foreign policy. The biggest thing that came out of the Saudi visit was a commitment of $600 billion in investments by the Saudis. We saw $142 billion
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
when he takes criticism about what his tariffs have done to the global economy, when he takes criticism about his economic stewardship broadly, what they always come back to is, look at all the money pouring into our country. That really is how he thinks about that. He thinks about the world in a very mercantilist way.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
And so the Saudis, the Qataris, the Emiratis, they are willing to play that game, to do these deals, to give Trump, metaphorically speaking, the big cardboard check with a lot of zeros on it. He likes that. The link is not ideology and democratic values. It's just kind of a pragmatism, a transactionalism, a mercantilism. Let's bring stability. Let's make everybody rich.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
You know, he's found some partners in the region in pursuing that kind of a foreign policy.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
Right. It's like, any questions? Any questions? Like, you summed it up. That's right. I mean, these different things, I mean, look, the LIV Golf, we haven't even talked about LIV Golf, but that's the Saudi-backed golf league that's a real competitor to the PGA Tour. And it's run by the head of Saudi Arabia's Sovereign Wealth Fund. You know, and what did they do? He hosted a tournament.
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
He hosted a tournament for them at Doral in Florida. And frankly...
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
And what happened? All of these people came to Doral, filled up the hotel, ate in the restaurant, sat out there on the golf course, right? So he has benefited from that. is clearly an ally of the Saudis as they, you know, the government is sort of working in this private space, but it's still the government, right?
Today, Explained
All the president’s side hustles
There's investors, Qatari investors, who have invested in some of the Trump Corporation projects over there. So they are working together in the sort of official space, and then they are working together in the private space as well. And that's just how he's going to run foreign policy. The ethical watchdogs can howl at the moon, but it's not going to stop him from operating this way.