Accusations against Trump and his foundation include the following:
Failure to maintain proper governance In a June 2018 petition filed by the office of the New York attorney general, it was explained that: In an exhibit attached to the filing, Trump Foundation treasurer Allen Weisselberg claimed he had not been aware that he was the treasurer or on the board of the foundation until he was approached by investigators. The Trump Foundation was initially registered as a private foundation set up solely to receive his own personal donations. As long as it was private and did not solicit outside funds, it did not have to file annual audited reports with the New York State Charities Bureau.
Mishandling of funds raised for veterans' causes In April 2016,
Fox News reported that more than two months after Trump said he had raised $6million for military veterans at a pre-
Iowa caucus fundraiser, "most of the organizations targeted to receive the money have gotten less than half of that amount". Around that time, Trump also said he had contributed $1,000,000 of his personal funds. In late May, Trump revised his figures downward, saying $5.6million had been raised at the event and that he had contributed his one million only the previous week, after the media criticized him. although the full amount is disputed in a lawsuit filed by New York State in 2018, which cites an amount of $2.8million.
Coordinating foundation grants with Trump's presidential campaign Trump may have used Trump Foundation grants to advance his presidential campaign, in violation of rules barring charities from engaging in political activity. Trump distributed at least some of the funds publicly at "Donald Trump for President" rallies, displaying large-size donation checks that included his campaign slogan "
Make America Great Again" or a link to a campaign website. Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg testified in an October 2017 deposition that he had witnessed Donald Trump's campaign staff coordinate with Trump to use the Iowa fundraiser to benefit the campaign.
Grants to the National Museum of Catholic Art and History In each of 1995 and 1999, the Trump Foundation granted $50,000 to the
National Museum of Catholic Art and History. A 2001 report by
The Village Voice stated, after visiting the museum in
East Harlem, that the facility had "next to no art" and no official connection to the
Catholic Church, despite a ten-year record of having solicited large-scale donations for its collection. The
Voice and, later,
The Washington Post, concluded that Trump may have directed the grants to the museum to curry favor with the museum's then-chairman, Eddie Malloy, who was also head of the
Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York. The council had worked on behalf of one of the unions of workers who worked on Trump construction projects.
Failure to make pledged 9/11 grants An investigation by the
New York City Comptroller's office in October 2016 showed that Trump and/or the Donald Trump Foundation may have failed to honor at least one pledge to charities established to provide relief for victims of the
September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Trump had made a pledge of $10,000 to the Twin Towers Fund on
The Howard Stern Show in late September 2001. The Twin Towers Fund, later administered as part of the New York City Public and Private Initiative, was created by
New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani "to benefit the families of firefighters and police officers who died in the attacks". During the
2016 Republican National Convention, Giuliani announced that Trump had made unspecified "anonymous" donations after the September 11 attacks, although such donations have not been identified. According to the
News, Comptroller
Scott Stringer "found that Trump and [the Trump Foundation] hadn't donated a dime in the months after 9/11"; however, because the reviewed period covered only one year after the attacks, the Comptroller's office was "unable to conclude definitively" that Trump never gave to the fund after August 2002. It also alleged that a shorter flagpole "would fail to appropriately express the magnitude of Donald J. Trump's... patriotism". Trump eventually reached a legal settlement with Palm Beach after, according to the
Sun Sentinel, "secret, court-ordered negotiations". To raise the money needed to make the settlement, the Trump Foundation auctioned a prize of lifetime golf membership at Trump-owned golf courses, with the winning bid bringing a $157,000 donation to the Trump Foundation to the foundation to offset the payment to the Greenberg Foundation. The winner of the auction may have believed he was donating to Trump Foundation charitable causes.
Donation to Florida attorney general Pam Bondi In 2013, the Trump Foundation donated $25,000 in support of
Florida attorney general Pam Bondi's election campaign while Bondi's office was reviewing fraud allegations against
Trump University, a for-profit real estate program. Around that time Trump also hosted a fundraiser for Bondi at his Mar-a-Lago resort at a fee well below his normal market rate. Bondi's office later ended the investigation without bringing charges. According to a Trump Foundation attorney, "the [$25,000] contribution was made in error due to a case of mistaken identity of organizations with the same name." Trump later personally reimbursed his foundation for the $25,000. The foundation paid a $2,500 fine for violating IRS rules against political contributions by charitable organizations.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a not-for-profit watchdog group, filed a complaint with the IRS (see below). It also cast doubt on Trump's story after obtaining a letter from the Trump Foundation's attorney to the New York attorney general's office. "We're past the point where a reasonable person could believe this is just a never-ending series of once in a lifetime errors", said CREW Communications Director Jordan Libowitz. "This may not be anything nefarious, but if it isn't, that would mean that the Trump operation is completely inept when it comes to running the Trump Foundation." On October 5, 2016,
The Wall Street Journal reported details of how Trump had on several other occasions since as early as the 1980s made campaign donations to various US state attorneys general while they had been reviewing cases involving the Trump Organization or Trump personally, although the Bondi case is the only one it cited as having involved Trump Foundation money.
Grants allegedly made for political purposes Trump paid $100,000 of Trump Foundation funds in 2012 to
Reverend Franklin Graham's
Billy Graham Evangelical Association.
NBC News has called Graham "an early ally" of Trump. "The more you listen to him, the more you say to yourself, 'You know, maybe the guy's right, Graham had told
ABC News in 2011. Graham also heads
Boone, North Carolina–based
Samaritan's Purse, a Christian relief agency that received $25,000 from the Trump Foundation in 2012. Graham credits
Fox News anchor
Greta Van Susteren for having solicited that donation. Van Susteren and her TV crew had accompanied Graham on Samaritan's Purse trips to Haiti and North Korea. The
Charlotte Observer quoted Graham saying, "[Trump] was on her show, and [Van Susteren] said, 'I was just in Haiti and Samaritan's Purse is doing this down there, and Donald, you need to help.' He sent a check out." In 2014 the Trump Foundation made a $100,000 grant to the
Citizens United Foundation, a charitable foundation closely related to
David Bossie's conservative group,
Citizens United. At the time Citizens United was engaged in a lawsuit against
New York State attorney general Eric Schneiderman, whose office was pursuing a civil suit against
Trump University. It was the largest single grant made by the Trump Foundation that year. Schneiderman's office called the grant part of a "vendetta" by Trump, while Citizens United rejected any connection between the grant and its own suit against Schneiderman. The Trump Foundation's 2014 tax filing misidentified Citizens United as a public charity (501(c)(3)) when it is in fact a social welfare organization (501(c)(4)). The Trump Foundation donated a total of $40,000 from 2011 through 2013 to the
Drumthwacket Foundation, a charitable organization formed to pay for renovation and historic preservation of the New Jersey governor's mansion of the same name. In 2011, Trump was seeking to acquire permits to build a personal cemetery on the fairway at the Trump National Golf Club in New Jersey and may have needed political help in obtaining approval for the permit. Trump directed $100,000 of Trump Foundation money toward the
National September 11 Memorial Museum days before the 2016 New York State Republican presidential primary, where he was on the ballot, mischaracterizing the foundation grant as a personal donation. In May 2015, the Trump Foundation granted $10,000 to
Project Veritas, a news organisation run by conservative filmmaker
James O'Keefe. In October 2016, O'Keefe released video which purportedly reveals how Democrats incited violence at Trump rallies. During the third
2016 presidential debate, Trump claimed that new videos produced by O'Keefe and released that week proved
Hillary Clinton and
Barack Obama had "hired people" and "paid them $1,500" to "be violent, cause fights, [and] do bad things" at Trump rallies. A
Democratic National Committee spokesman noted Trump's donation after Project Veritas released another video on the 2016 presidential election. A Project Veritas spokesman said the Trump Foundation's donation "didn't impact our actions one way or the other" and were a small part of the organization's budget. Trump may have strategically directed money from the Trump Foundation to support his presidential campaign. In one case, the grants were used specifically to pay for newspaper ads. In addition to Citizens United (above), groups include Iowa's
The Family Leader, the South Carolina
Palmetto Family Council, the
American Conservative Union, and the American Spectator Foundation. Trump's granting of foundation money to these groups could have violated the law, if it was in return for his personal right to speak or gain access to networking events. • The Trump Foundation's grant of $10,000 in 2013 to
The Family Leader may have led to a speaking engagement for Trump. The Family Leader is an Iowa-based organization whose stated mission is to "strengthen families, by inspiring Christ-like leadership in the home, the church, and the government". Following the grant, the group's leader, Vader Plaats, invited Trump to speak at its leadership summit. held at his
Mar-a-Lago country club in Florida after his wife
Melania Trump made the highest bid. The painter's former production manager told
The Washington Post that he had, at the request of Trump's wife
Melania, shipped the painting to the
Trump National Golf Club Westchester in
Briarcliff Manor, New York, allegedly for display in the country club's boardroom or conference room. Tax experts told the
Post that if it was displayed at the golf club, it could violate
Internal Revenue Service rules prohibiting non-profits from
self-dealing, i.e. charitable funding of a noncharitable purpose. • In 2014, at a charity for the Unicorn Children's Foundation, held at his
Mar-a-Lago resort, Trump purchased a four-foot-tall portrait of himself in the 1990s by Argentine artist
Havi Schanz and paid for it with $20,000 of Trump Foundation funds. Trump
presidential campaign spokesperson
Boris Epshteyn said that Trump's use of the painting at Trump's Champions Bar & Grill was not "absolutely proper" under an IRS rule allowing individuals to store items "on behalf of the foundation—in order to help with storage costs" and that Trump was "doing his foundation a favor" by using the portrait on the restaurant wall. • In 2008, Trump used $107,000 of Trump Foundation funds to purchase a luxury trip to Paris, including a meeting with actress
Salma Hayek, at a charity auction for the Gucci Foundation. The current whereabouts of the helmet and jersey are unknown. Tax law experts say if Trump kept them, the purchase might have violated the self-dealing rule, which bans private foundations from "the furnishing of goods" to their officers. • In 2013, the Trump Foundation made a $5,000 grant to the non-profit D.C. Preservation League. According to
The Washington Post, the nonprofit's support helped the Trump Organization obtain the rights to convert
Washington, D.C.'s historic
Old Post Office Pavilion into the Trump International Hotel. In acknowledgment of the donation, the Trump Foundation received ads in the event programs; the ads promoted Trump's hotels rather than the foundation, in possible violation of IRS self-dealing rules. The
Post found old
Associated Press coverage showing that Trump may have started directing income to the Trump Foundation as early as 1989. IRS rules prohibit individuals from diverting taxable income owed to them toward charities if they benefit directly from those charities unless the individual declares the income on his tax forms. • $100,000 from the family of Donna Clancy, whose family law office had been renting space at the Trump Organization's
40 Wall Street building. • $100,000 in 2005 for work by Trump's wife
Melania for
Norwegian Cruise Lines for a segment that was later included in Trump's show,
The Apprentice. A spokeswoman for the company confirmed that the appearance fee to Melania was paid in the form of a donation to the Trump Foundation. Some examples: • In 2010, Trump was personally honored for his support by the Palm Beach Police Foundation after the Trump Foundation donated to the charity $150,000 during the period of 2009–2010. According to the police foundation's public tax records, Palm Beach Police Foundation paid the Trump Organization $276,463 in rent in 2014 for its "Police Ball and Auction" which was held at Trump's Mar-a-Lago hotel. For each of the four years prior to 2014, the police foundation's public tax records show significant "direct expenses" incurred for both the tournament and the Ball and Auction, although expense categories are not cited in the filings.
Trump taking personal credit for donations made using foundation money Both
The Washington Post and
Fox News reported that Trump repeatedly claimed in public, beginning in 2015, to have made over "$102 million" in charitable donations "in the past five years". The Trump Organization provided journalists with a 93-page list of the donations. None of the cash donations were confirmed to come from Trump himself; many were actually grants from the Trump Foundation. For example, Trump took personal credit and was honored for a Trump Foundation grant to the Palm Beach Police Foundation that was actually from an outside source (see above). He had pledged the money personally, and then the Trump Foundation solicited the $150,000 earmarked for the police foundation from an unrelated philanthropic organization, the Charles Evans Foundation. The Trump Foundation then paid the Palm Beach charity.
The Washington Post wrote that "Trump had effectively turned the Evans Foundation's gifts into his gifts, without adding any money of his own." The
Dana–Farber Cancer Institute has honored Trump variously as "Grand Benefactor" and "Grand Honorary Chair" at its annual fundraisers held at Trump's
Mar-a-Lago estate. Trump may have also earned more money on the event fees it received from the institute than the Trump Foundation paid to the institute in grants. Trump has directed at least $300,000 of grants of the Trump Foundation money to Dana-Farber since 2010. Trump received highly visible praise for his generosity on his prime-time television show
The Apprentice. He frequently offered to make generous donations to his contestants' charities, but records show that he ultimately either directed the Trump Foundation to make a grant or had the show's network,
NBC Universal, make the donation. • In 2012 Trump promised at least six personal donations of $10,000 each to contestants' chosen charities during one episode of
Celebrity Apprentice. In another episode of the same season, he pledged $10,000 to contestant
Aubrey O'Day's chosen charity, a gift "that moved [contestant and comedienne Lisa]
Lampanelli to tears." but the donation came from the Trump Foundation. • Trump taking personal credit for a $25,000 grant from the Trump Foundation at a speech honoring slain journalist
James Foley in 2014. At the time, the
New Hampshire Union Leader published an article titled "Trump leads tribute for slain journalist James Foley". Foley was posthumously awarded the 12th annual Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment Award, "given annually to New Hampshire organizations or residents who protect or exemplify the liberties listed in the First Amendment to the Constitution". Trump was the "featured speaker of the event". • Trump receiving personal praise for a $100,000 Trump Foundation grant in 2016 to the
National September 11 Memorial Museum ahead of the 2016 New York State Republican Primary (above). Trump Foundation tax returns show that it failed to do this for all twenty of the grants it made to private foundations during the period of 2005 through 2014. Such grants in this period, which total at least $488,500, could have been subject to significant fines and penalties.
Receiving donation from Ukrainian oligarch during campaign for president In 2015, Ukrainian
Victor Pinchuk made a $150,000 donation to the Trump Foundation in return for Trump's appearance by video conference link at the Yalta European Strategy Conference. The appearance was broadcast on a large screen and lasted only twenty minutes, including delays caused by translation and by technical difficulties. Pinchuk is the son-in-law of former Ukrainian president
Lionid Kuchma. In 2018
The New York Times reported that the office of
Special Counsel Robert Mueller was investigating the donation as a possible illegal in-kind campaign contribution from a foreign national intended to curry favor with then-candidate Trump. == Legal actions and closure ==