Outrage in Albania over Kushner-Trump $1.6bn luxury resort – The Latest

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0:44It's pretty hard to imagine a retreat on the scale you're talking about here. You know,$1.6 billion that would not massively hurt the environment. An unbelievable, beautiful 1 ,400-hectare private island in the middle of the Mediterranean. hand. Obviously part of what attracted them to it was this sort of natural splendor, but then they have been bulldozing forests, hired a security firm to keep locals out, and that has sparked a huge amount of anger. It's a government directly selling to Kushner, but it really just blurs the line between the role of a sort of private real estate developer and a geopolitical actor.

1:22From the Guardians today in Focus, this is The Latest with me, Lucy Hoff. There have been huge protests in Albania this week as the daughter of the US President Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner get underway with their plans to develop this private resort on a private island off the coast of Albania in the Mediterranean, as well as along this wild uninhabited coastline, which has, you know, this great environmental reserves. Chris Michael, our US editor based in London, has been across this. I mean, let's zoom in on Cezanne, this private island. What is the vision of the Kushner Trump model here?

2:09Well, to hear them describe it, they were on a boat tour with their friend, Nat Rothschild, you know, now the fifth baron Rothschild, as you do, and discovered this island, swam across it, walked it barefoot, had an amazing connection, almost a sort of spiritual experience with the land to hear Ivanka describe it. She says she walked the lands and she had, she thought about what kind of life it is that she wanted to live. And I guess the conclusion was she wanted to live in a private luxury resort with her husband and rich people who could afford to join her. And so what they want to do is build a luxury retreat.

2:57They're calling it an eco retreat, but it's basically a luxury resort. There was talk of 10 ,000 hotel rooms. 10 ,000 hotel rooms? Yes, as per some reporting anyway. The point is, I guess, that this will be a very expensive place to spend your holiday. And it's part of a vision, not only for Jared and Ivanka, but for Eddie Rama, the socialist prime minister of Albania, who really wants to develop the coastline of Albania in a similar way to neighbors like Italy, Greece, Croatia. And the way that they want to do that is not by getting, you know, normal middle class or poor people to come visit, because Albania has had loads of visitors recently, but by just having a few very rich people in a sort of luxury retreat.

3:46Yeah, in an interview Ivanka Trump gave this week, it was, as you say, this kind of spiritual experience. It was the sort of energy that you might get from someone kind of coming off a five day ayahuasca retreat in Peru. this sort of spiritual becoming, because what she will have seen as she walked barefoot along this coastline is this uninhabited home to more than 200 bird species, many endangered flamingos, Dalmatian pelicans. I imagine that's not what Jared and Ivanka were attracted to, given that they planned to basically bulldoze it all down and build this, as you say, kind of mega luxury resort.

4:31That is the cause of some of the public anger, isn't it? There's other factors at play that we'll come to politically. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this is a protected environmental area. As you say, it's home to endangered bird species, to a population of monk seals. Obviously, part of what attracted them to it was this sort of natural splendor, but then they have been bulldozing forests. They've just erected a massive concrete barrier with barbed wire, hired a security firm to keep locals out. And that has sparked a huge amount of anger. Some of the people who've shown up to complain have been dragged away by these private security guards.

5:11And, you know, it's pretty hard to imagine a retreat on the scale you're talking about here, you know,$1.6 billion that would not massively hurt the environment of one of the last wild places in the Mediterranean. Yeah, it is extraordinary the sum of upwards of 1.5 billion that's being used for this. As you said, there is a political dimension to this about how this deal was done, which is that Albania is one of the poorest countries in Europe. It's now become a kind of booming tourist destination. The Prime Minister is desperate for more foreign investment to come in. But as you say, the way that this has been done has raised all sorts of questions for Albanians about transparency.

5:54And indeed, that's why lots of them have taken to the streets. What do we know about how this was done? Eddie Rama and Jared Kushner had met. They say it wasn't when Kushner was officially working for the Trump administration. But, you know, Kushner is an unofficial envoy of Trump in so many other areas that I think that distinction is a bit silly. In 2024, new changes were made to environmental legislation and Bushner's project, which is being led by Affinity Partners, this big investment fund, was fast-tracked. So they were allowed to have a special deal that allowed them to go straight to the development stage.

6:37And the nature of that, those changes to the regulation are now under investigation by Albania's anti-corruption body, not specifically this deal itself, but the broader idea about changes to how the environment is protected in the country. I mean, as you say, Jared Kushner is currently a very busy man because he's alternating these trips to Albania along with his team of high end luxury real estate developers and architects, as well as playing a role in the Iran peace negotiations with the US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff. So lots of time on jets for him. And I'm just wondering, I mean, this must be going down very badly in the public towards the Albanian government, given the clear conflict of interest of money associated with the Trump administration pouring into Albania.

7:26How is the Albania government responding to this? Well, Eddie Rama says that they need investment like a desert needs water. He said that, you know, he said he wants to talk to the protesters about their concerns, but also basically this project is going ahead no matter what. And you'll stop it over my dead body in so many words. You know, he definitely thinks that Albania needs to be closer to the West. Albania is not in the EU. They want to be that by 2030, that's Eddie Rama's goal. And we know that Trump can directly hit countries that he doesn't like, that don't do what he says by tariffs.

8:09And Albania doesn't have the sort of protection of being under the EU umbrella that other places might have. And the other sort of pattern to note here is that this is a deal directly with a foreign government. It's not like a private land deal where you've just bought some land, buying and selling. it's a government directly selling to Kushner that was the exact same pattern in Serbia a similar Kushner project to develop again a former military site into a hotel resort and Eddie Rama in Albania was like yeah you know it's all part of helping Serbia not be sucked into Moscow's orbit and it really just blurs the line between the role of a sort of private real estate developer and a geopolitical actor yeah but I mean obviously there's this broader problem about the way that the Trump family that's been reported by our paper, The Guardian, but elsewhere, how they have been enriching themselves in the years since Donald Trump was first elected president and all sorts of allegations of corruption on that.

9:07This is another example of that, isn't it? You know, literally, whilst Ivanka's dad is the president, she is using vast sums of money to build foreign investments elsewhere. Yeah, Affinity Partners is Kushner's fund. It got its first major trench of investment from Saudi Arabia,$2 billion. This is, as you note, a very clear conflict of interest given. First of all, Kushner defended Mohammed bin Salman against the criticism that he received after the death of the Washington Post journalist, Ramel Khashoggi. So, you know, there's partly that, but also Trump vetoed a bill that would have stopped arms sales that would help Saudi Arabia and its proxy war in Yemen.

9:53And other investments into Affinity funds have come from Qatar and from Abu Dhabi. In fact, although it's based in Miami, nominally, 99 % of the funds in Affinity Partners have come from abroad, and most of it is in the Middle East. And then you have Kushner acting as Trump's, you know, semi-official envoy in the Middle East, negotiating peace deals. You know, he was a key player in the so-called peace deal in Gaza, which doesn't look like much of a peace deal at all. But Kushner then at the same time has spoken glowingly about how the waterfront properties have great potential in Gaza. So yeah, in all of these places, there's just a very obvious double dealing going on that Kushner always talks about as though it couldn't possibly be the case that there would ever be.

10:47You know, when I was in government, what I'm doing in my private life are just completely separate. As if he's got a sort of a wall in his mind that can divide the two. But I mean, I think anybody paying attention knows better. Yeah, I don't think it's a wall that exists in anyone else's mind, Chris. Thank you so much. Thanks, Lizzie. That's it for today. My huge thanks again to Chris Michael, The Guardian's US live news editor based in London. You can keep up with all our reporting on this story over at theguardian.com. And do head over to our sister podcast, Politics Weekly, where our political editor, Pippa Crearer, has been out and about in Makerfield with Andy Burnham, our potential PM in waiting.

11:25Thanks for listening to this episode of The Latest. Today in Focus will be back in your feeds as usual on Monday morning. The Latest will be back on Monday night. This episode was produced by Bryony Moore. It was presented by me, Lucy Hoth. The senior producer was Ryan Rangobin.

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