'If You Can Keep It': How Trump’s Getting Rich As President

0:28This message comes from Angie. fortune while serving as president. In 2024, the year before his second term started, the president made about$600 million. In 2025, one year into his new term, that number jumped to more than$2.2 billion. The latest White House disclosures show that most of those earnings came from cryptocurrency and crypto-related businesses. A big driver? $800 million from the crypto investment firm World Liberty Financial, which the president founded along with Middle East envoy Steve Whitcoff and their sons. Also, about$600 million paid to the president last year by partners who sold his meme coin cryptocurrency.

1:11Investors in the meme coin lost$3.8 billion, according to the New York Times. And the president continues to make millions from real estate and golf deals, many of them in foreign countries, while they're negotiating with the U.S. government that he controls. That's just a glimpse at the cash. The latest disclosures don't include other enrichment for the president, like the$400 million Boeing 747 jet gifted for his personal use by the government of Qatar. I'm Todd Zwilich. You're listening to the 1A Podcast. Today, as part of our weekly series, If You Can Keep It, where we cover the health of our democracy, we dive into the scale of President Trump's personal enrichment in his second term and why you need to know about it.

1:56That's right after this.

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2:41With Capital One, get a full suite of financial products and services tailored to meet your needs today and goals for tomorrow. Learn more at capital.one slash commercial. Member FDIC. This message comes from Working Forests Initiative. Working forest professionals in the U.S. plant more than they harvest while also caring for water, wildlife, and more. It's how a sustainable future is grown. Learn more at workingforestsinitiative.com. Let's meet our guest. Russ Buettner is an investigative reporter at the New York Times covering the president's finances. Russ, welcome. Good to be with you, Todd.

3:20Michelle Conlon is also here, senior correspondent at Reuters, where she covers the Trump businesses and crypto. Michelle, good to have you here. Thanks so much for having me. All right, Russ, Michelle, we're going to talk about the president's personal wealth and about how family members use government policy and government contracts to profit while their father sits in the White House. Is there any precedent, though, Russ, for this in American history? What stands out to you about the scope and the scale of President Trump's self-enrichment? Have we ever seen this before? No, I don't think there's ever been anything like this in our nation's history.

3:56I think for a recent point of reference, you can look at the things that the Trumps themselves and the rest of the Republican Party said about Hunter Biden sitting on the board of an energy company when his father, I believe, wasn't even in the office and making a little bit of money for selling some paintings. And you think about what they're doing right now, where they're collecting$600 million for selling basically an electronic trading card that has no value other than if somebody else wants to buy it. and that's just pure profit that goes right into the family's pocket. That alone would be something that was unheard of in our nation's history.

4:37Typically, presidents have avoided anything that might make it look like they were subject to influence or acting in their personal interests rather than the nation's interests. President Trump has said he feels like he did that during his first term and the lesson from that was that he thought nobody cared. So this time, all holds are off, and they're figuring out a multitude of ways to collect money in areas they have no real history or experience. I mean, Russ, one thing that comes to mind is just the example of Jimmy Carter. It was many decades ago, but he had a peanut farm when he got elected president, and I believe he sold it so that there wasn't an appearance of conflict of interest owning a peanut farm and being president.

5:20Yeah, Todd, that's sort of the spirit that these things have operated in for our nation's history. I think one lesson of the Trump administration is that typically these things have happened by norms, not by laws, but by norms. Presidents have just chosen to not do these things that might make it look like they had anything other than societal good in their mind. And that's no longer the case. Michelle, let's talk about Donald Trump's crypto earnings. Russ alluded to them. They make up the bulk of what's included in these latest financial disclosures from the White House. Much of that comes from one source.

5:59I mentioned it, World Liberty Financial. What is that company? How has it made Donald Trump so much money? Sure. Well, World Liberty Financial, you can think of it like a bank, but the Trump bank of crypto. And interestingly, just recently, World Liberty Financial got preliminary approval to actually become a bank. And we looked at, in our examination, we looked at the kind of the four of the main crypto ventures, World Liberty Financial being the biggest, and found that through April, so since the time Trump took office through April, the Trumps had pocketed$2.3 billion to their family fortune, while investors, many of them small retail investors, have lost$2.3 billion.

6:49And of the four crypto entities that we looked at, World Liberty Financial is by far the biggest money spinner in that universe of crypto companies. Russ, who's investing in World Liberty Financial? We've talked before about figures like Justin Sun, a foreign national who was under investigation by the SEC. until shortly after he made an investment of tens of millions of dollars into world liberty. There's another figure named Gurren Babi Zhu who you've been writing about. Who's Babi Zhu? Babi Zhu has been until recently sort of an enigma. He's a fellow, it turns out, who purchased or presides over a company, an upstart company in the United Arab Emirates that purchased$100 million worth of world liberty financial tokens.

7:43When he initially sort of hid his involvement in that, he had good reason to. It turns out he was under investigation for money laundering in the United Kingdom. When I started trying to find evidence of where his money might have came from, everything just melted in your hands. an editor at the paper described it as sort of the the talented what was that movie the talented mr ripley yeah matt damon yeah matt damon right where he he made all these announcements that he made it seem like he had access to great fortunes over the years um he had he had had a retail set of retail stores in the united kingdom that sold hardwood flooring that his father They're manufactured in China.

8:27Those businesses all went bankrupt. He started a crypto business that made these big announcements, including that it had a billion-dollar fund with a Chinese state-owned financial institution, that it had the support of entities tied to royal families in the United Arab Emirates. But when I contacted all those people, none of that was true. He had made it all up. And those people had told him to please stop using his name, But those announcements lived on and made it look like he had access to some money. So, Russ, if Bobby Zhu has no discernible source of massive wealth of his own, where's the money coming from?

9:07What does it say about the source of the money that he's funneling into Donald Trump, his company, and his personal fortune? It's an excellent question, Todd. I think the amazing part of this is that it shouldn't be really hard to figure out where$75 million, where that money comes from when it gets stuffed into the pocket of a United States president. That was the Trump family's take from that, about$75 million in one day. But when you look through his public record, there is no source of that, no business success and no alliances that have happened that you can see where that money came from.

9:46So I've spent a great amount of time on this. As near as I can tell, there is nothing there. They don't answer questions on it. The Trump family won't say if they're aware of where that money came from. And again, this was a company that he had moved to the United Arab Emirates under investigation for money laundering, still under investigation for there. And within about four months, after having left the United Kingdom without really any discernible money, suddenly had access to this fortune. And then has sort of gone dormant again since. So it does make you wonder who provided that and what their motives were and what the Trumps know about that.

10:23But none of them are talking about it. So, Michelle, we're talking about the president of the United States here, not just some, you know, more random business owner or investor. But how common is this phenomenon, mysterious sources of income, when we talk about the crypto business? Oh, it's the theme. It's the leitmotif. You know, because it's crypto, which is, you know, famous for money laundering and all sorts of other illicit activities, because it's really hidden behind code and numbers and digits. And it's an anonymous way that you can send millions, billions of dollars around the world.

11:06and because of that, I mean, we do know that a bulk of the investors, early investors, and for example, World Liberty Financial, for example, the Trump meme coin, we do know that about almost 75 % of those were foreign investors. We just don't know much more beyond that. We know that because you can track the exchanges that they use And through that, you can see how many of these were likely people in the USA, how many were likely foreign. So the fact that it's so much foreign money and the fact that it's hidden behind these numbers and digits and anonymous crypto code just begs all sorts of questions.

11:51It's just a dizzying situation that the United States has never been in before. Michelle, just briefly, though, you're describing a world of secret investors, cloaked cash, problematic in any financial market. With the president of the United States, what's the risk here for the people he represents? The risk is that some of this money is being used to influence policy, influence decisions, influence all sorts of decisions that have no transparency around them. Coming up, President Trump's social media company unveiled a subscription service that would let users view his posts early for as much as a$100 ,000 fee per month.

12:35Why this has some government transparency advocates more than a little concerned. The crypto business and a whole lot more. That's coming up.

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14:02Call 1-800-GRAINGER, click grainger.com, or just stop by. Grainger, for the ones who get it done. Let's get back to our conversation on President Trump's growing wealth during his second term. The New Yorker's David Kirkpatrick estimates that by January of 2026, the president and his family had made more than$4 billion so far in his second term through ventures like the private club in Washington, D.C. that Donald Trump Jr. co-owns that promises access to administration officials and the luxury jet that Qatar gifted for the president's use as Air Force One and after his term. Michelle Conlon, you mentioned something before we took a break that World Liberty Financial has been granted preliminary approval by the Treasury Department of the Trump administration to operate as a federally chartered bank.

14:57Now, Elizabeth Warren, the senator who's the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, said this about that new charter. This is a quote. President Trump is now the first president in history to approve, operate and supervise his own bank. She goes on to say this is the most brazen act of self-dealing in our financial system has ever seen. Is that characterization by Elizabeth Warren fair? And what does it mean now for world liberty that it can be maybe that it's on the road to being a bank? It's a big deal because it will enable world liberty to grow. It will enable world liberty to take on institutional clients.

15:39It lends world liberty this veneer of federal approval. And so this is a huge step change for the company. I mean, since the company launched shortly before the 2024 election, it sort of tried out, made announcements it was going to do various things like an app. And that never materialized. And it's gone around and around on announcing that it would do different sorts of things. But it seems to be finding its groove now in terms of trying to get into the banking business. And, of course, they have their own stablecoin, USD1. And so the idea is with this preliminary approval, if it turns into permanent approval, World Liberty would then be able to juice much greater adoption of its stablecoin.

16:33So I'll leave out the characterization of brazen by Elizabeth Warren, but she says it's one of the biggest acts of self-dealing our financial system has ever seen. I mean, there's a lot of financial dealing in the history of the American financial system. Is she onto something, though? Is there a different level of self-dealing here that we haven't seen in American banking? I mean, certainly you now have a situation where the president of the United States' family essentially has a crypto bank. So the government that's supposed to regulate and oversee this bank is controlled by the administration of the president.

17:15And I think there's a fair argument to make from those who are super, super concerned about all of this crypto moneymaking on behalf of the Trump family that the conflicts of interest mount and just get more and more severe. And we're seeing an escalation and an intensification of the conflicts of interest. And in fact, when I talk to government ethics experts about this, they always say to me, conflict of interest, we don't even have a phrase in the English language right now to describe what this is. Or they'll say, oh, people say this is unprecedented for a president, and these ethics experts will tell me.

17:58That word doesn't capture it either, that the words aren't really there to sort of describe what this is. I think their minds are blown. That's what you're describing from the perspective of people who police ethics for a living. We're going to talk a little bit more about the ways in which some of this enrichment is interacting with U.S. policy that Donald Trump is in control of as president of the United States. But, Russ, I mentioned a figure as we came back from a break that the actual figure of enrichment for the Trump family may be as high as$4 billion, higher than the$2.2 billion included in the White House disclosures that were released under legal requirements.

18:39What ventures are not included in those disclosures? How much bigger is this universe than what's required under what the White House put out? I'm not sure I have a good answer for that question, Todd. I think that part of that may be that the Trump family, money that goes to Don Jr. and to Eric and to Barron would not necessarily be included in the Trump's financial disclosure form. So, for instance, there's a drone company that Don Jr. is on the board of. He was given several hundred thousand shares of that company for joining the board. had no experience with defense, had no experience in drones, obviously.

19:21But that has been very lucrative for him. He now owns shares that are worth somewhere north of$6 million, maybe as much as$10 million. And last week, the president announced he would have tariffs on drone equipment that was manufactured elsewhere. That greatly benefits the company that Don Jr. happens to sit on the board of. And so the stock rose in the double digits after that announcement. So those are things that would not be included on the financial disclosure form, but are greatly enriching the Trump family. The company is Unusual Machines, and I think its stock jumped about 25 percent after the president slapped tariffs on foreign drones with military applications.

20:07And I think that Don Jr. owns something on the order of 300 ,000 shares. So we're talking about big money, Russ. We're talking about big money. And again, to go to the good point Michelle made about people trying to find the right word for this stuff. And it's not that there's not a president. It's not the conflict of interest. I think you can think of world liberty if you take a step back. And most of these companies is essentially a billboard for bribery. There's a website, has the president's name on it, a picture on it, his name on it. At the bottom of the website, it says, if you buy this token, this is how much goes to the President of the United States.

20:45World Liberty, by law, keeps a register of the people who buy those tokens. So they know, but we don't know. And it's all hidden behind this veil of secrecy. And also another word that sort of doesn't fit this is we use the word investment for when people buy these tokens. But it's not an investment in a typical sense. You're not getting an equity stake in the company as you would if you bought a stock. You're buying a token. And that gives you some minimal amount of voting rights and their governance, but you don't have a share of their profits or their losses. Your only profit is going to be if you can sell those tokens for more.

21:20And so far, that's not working out for anyone except for the Trumps. If someone buys those tokens, they take the money right out the back door right away. And so they also have no vested interest in the company's success. And I think the critical thing that you just said so it doesn't blow by people is that the directors of World Liberty Financial know who purchases the tokens. They know who puts the millions in, even if we don't. That's exactly right. They have to keep a registry of that under something that's called know-your-customer rules that are meant to prevent money laundering. So, yeah, they know exactly who it is, is buying these things, is enriching the family, and is perhaps trying to curry favor with them as well.

21:59Brian emails this. We know he's grifting all he can. My question is, when will somebody do something about this? Well, Michelle, Senate Republicans have been pushing for a bill. It's called the Clarity Act. It aims to regulate the crypto industry. Democrats have criticized that bill for not putting limits on politicians profiting off of crypto, citing President Trump's own crypto earnings. What can you tell us about the Clarity Act and where accountability, the kind of accountability that Brian seems to be looking for may or may not be? Good question. Well, let's go back to the run-up to the election.

22:38You know, the crypto industry poured tens of millions of dollars into helping Donald Trump get elected. He gets elected. He gets inaugurated. Things look great. We're going to get the Clarity Act. This is very exciting for crypto proponents. And what you can see is that the chances of this bill passing, were very, very high as recently as January, and it now looks more and more unlikely that this is going to pass this term. And the closer we get to the midterms, the more this bill is in jeopardy. The bill was criticized by Democratic lawmakers because, well, for one, they didn't like the ethics provision, which basically would grandfather all of President Trump's crypto activity, his family's activity, and sort of make it okay.

23:34But Democrats were also really concerned about that they felt the bill was very weak on law enforcement tools, because of course we know crypto's great for things like money laundering, sanctions evasion, and all sorts of illicit activity. So even if this bill had passed or even if it does pass, as it stands the way it's written now, it doesn't have very sharp teeth in terms of enforcement and regulation. What does White House lobbying look like on this bill on Capitol Hill? Intense, furious, unprecedented, to put that word out there again. And, you know, the crypto industry really went all in on the Trump administration.

24:24And it's been high drama and high theater in Washington because it just looked like it was so likely to sail through. And I think today maybe you'd put the chances of it at, you know, 10 percent, very slim, which is really, you know, bad news for the crypto industry. But for people who are really concerned about the runaway train that crypto's been during the Trump administration, you know, perhaps that's better news for them. And then, of course, you know, we'll have the midterms. And, you know, if the Democrats retake one or two chambers, that'll reshuffle the whole game board on this. Let's add another voice to the conversation now.

25:02Lauren Harper is the Daniel Ellsberg chair on government secrecy at the Freedom of the Press Foundation. Been on 1A before. Lauren, great to see you again. Thank you. We've been talking about the president's self-enrichment this term. One thing that has come up that we haven't quite delved into too much is Truth Social, the president's social media company that he's heavily invested in, and Truth Social's his posting place. You and your organization have filed a lawsuit against Trump Media and Technology Group over this plan to sell early access to the president's posts on Truth Social for up to$100 ,000 a month.

25:41The company says that more than 10 customers have already signed up for that subscription service, mostly trading firms. Why does this new Truth Social service concern you and your group? Why are you suing? Sure, there are three reasons. So as you mentioned, Trump Media and Technology Group, which owns Truth Social, in which Trump is the largest shareholder has announced this new plan offering between$60 ,000 and$100 ,000 a month for this subscription service. And it is problematic for three reasons. The first is that the president's announcements on any third-party sites, whether that's True Social, X, or what have you, that concern government affairs, you know, anything from sweeping tariff announcements to military escalation in Iran to announcing cabinet change-ups, these are all presidential records, which means that they are public property.

26:28And True Social has no business selling public property at all, even if it's for a millisecond. The other problem that this presents is because these posts, especially in the age of algorithmic trading, can move global and financial markets, poly markets, this creates a financial risk that Trump might post the kind of things that could encourage more deep-pocketed donors to sign up or that might benefit any of Trump's holdings. And finally, it violates constitutional protections guaranteeing public equal access to official government statements. And at the same time this is happening, the administration is trying to gut the law that regulates access to presidential records, the PRA, the Presidential Records Act.

27:10Those are the reasons why FPF and The Intercept are suing. Martha asks this. How is selling early access to Trump's stated intentions and plans by subscription not a kind of insider trading and not already completely illegal? I agree. He shouldn't be doing it at all. And there's the other take, which, you know, Bloomberg and there are other subscription services for early access to records, but it's worth mentioning, you know, news outlets and other services like this are not the government. These other companies can report the news, but the president itself makes the news and makes policy. You know, a sitting president can't constitutionally privatize advanced access to official acts to enrich a company in which he is the majority stakeholder.