Chinese Fifth Column in the U.S.

Peter Schweizer’s ‘Secret Empires’ Exposes China’s Calculated Effort to Buy Influence Through Washington Political Elites

By ROBERT KRAYCHIK
The Chinese regime purchases political influence in America via the cultivation of economic relationships with prominent politicians’ family members, including Hunter Biden, the son of Joe Biden.

China expert Steven Mosher joined Friday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight to discuss the revelations in Peter Schweizer’s new book, Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and Enriches Family and Friends, concerning the Chinese government’s influence peddling via “sweetheart deals” with family members of prominent American politicians.
Mosher, the president of the Population Research Institute and author of Bully of Asia: Why China’s Dream is the New Threat to World Order, explained how Schweizer’s new book documents a form of “officially sanctioned corruption” that is deeply rooted in Chinese political culture. 

He detailed how the Chinese regime purchases political influence in America via the cultivation of economic relationships with prominent politicians’ family members, including, as Schweizer’s book reveals, the son of Joe Biden, the father- and sister-in-law of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and the son-in-law of President Donald Trump.
In his interview Friday with Breitbart Senior Editor-at-Large Rebecca Mansour, Mosher praised Schweizer’s past work, as president of the Government Accountability Institute, in exposing government corruption.
“I have to say that Peter Schweizer — who I’ve known for many years and I regard as a friend — is just a bulldog when it comes to this kind of thing,” Mosher said. 

“He does his research, he’s gone into the Chinese language websites of some of these firms and translated them into English and made accessible to us information that we would never otherwise know. It’s an amazing piece of research.”
Mansour and her guest co-host, actress and author Sam Sorbo, detailed the revelations in Schweizer’s book concerning the Chinese government’s influence peddling in America, including the close ties between the Chinese regime and the family shipping business founded by Elaine Chao’s father. 

Elaine Chao is Mitch McConnell’s wife and President Trump’s Transportation Secretary. McConnell’s sister- and father-in-law both sat on the board of China State Shipbuilding Corp. (CSSC), a state-run shipbuilding company described by Schweizer as “a state-owned defense conglomerate … at the heart of the Chinese government’s military-industrial complex.”
Mansour further noted that, according to Schweizer’s research, the Chinese government-controlled Bank of China appointed McConnell’s sister-in-law, Angela Chao, to its board of directors “shortly after President Trump was elected.”
“The bank’s board of directors up until that point included all senior Chinese officials and one lone Dutch banker,” said Mansour, before sarcastically remarking, “Now, I’m sure it was all based on [Angela Chao’s] qualifications, and she was the most qualified member of Mitch McConnell’s family to get that position. So I don’t think we have anything to worry about.”
Mosher described China’s influence peddling as a “reverse King Midas effect,” drawing on the Greek mythological figure’s ability to turn things to gold with a touch. 

The Chinese, he said, held gold in their hands as they sought to purchase influence from various figures and companies. 

He further explained how corrupt influence peddling is deeply rooted in Chinese political history.

“What we see in China is kind of a reverse King Midas effect,” said Mosher. 

“We all remember the Greek story of King Midas, who whenever he touched something it turned to gold. Well, whenever the Chinese communists touch anything, they have gold in their hands and they want to pass it along to the person or company they’re dealing with, so it really is all buying influence. This has a long history in China, by the way, going back a couple of thousand years.”
Mosher explained, “When Chinese officials were appointed to govern a province or …. a county, the emperor who appointed them did not give them a budget, he just gave them permission to go to that county [or] province and extort, accept bribes, accept fees of various kinds, and tax the people into poverty. They were expected to raise their own money [and] budget to support themselves, their households, and all their employees in the official government residence…. They would be on the take from the get-go. That’s what was expected of them, so it was officially sanctioned corruption.”
“The political culture of China from the beginning has been based on this kind of corruption of officials using their authority [and] power to make money [and] to use money to make even more money,” said Mosher. 

“What we now see on the international stage is this whole Chinese gold play that happens inside of China — it’s happened for hundreds of years — now it’s being exported to other parts of the world like the United States, and again, the reverse King Midas effect, how they’re corrupting everything they touch including the family members of American politicians who actually may not be that hard to bring around to the Chinese point of view.”
“What did China get in exchange?” Mansour asked Mosher.
“I think there’s no question that China wants something in exchange,” replied Mosher. 

“These are not free gifts. This is not a market-based investment, for example, into the Rosemont Seneca firm that was set up by Hunter Biden [and] Devon Archer, as [Peter Schweizer] reports. This was a calculated effort to buy influence with the son of the vice president of the United States... Had you or I walked in with the same proposal, we wouldn’t even have gotten past the receptionist. These people were able to get in because of their parents [and] their family connections to see very high-level officials who consciously wanted to ink a deal in order to rope them into the Chinese way of seeing and doing things.”

Mosher explained the revelation in Schweizer’s book concerning a billion-dollar investment firm established by Hunter Biden — Joe Biden’s son — and the state-run Bank of China.
“In [Peter Schweizer’s] account that was published in the New York Post, it’s very clear that one of the consequences of this one-billion dollar investment fund that was set up and guaranteed by China — by the way, so you can’t lose money, again, it’s not a market-based decision; if the Chinese government is guaranteeing the fund then it’s a no-lose proposition — and they went out and bought an American company that had a dual-use technology that was useful in not just a commercial sense, but in a military sense, as well, and for some reason this sale, which should have been blocked, was approved,” related Mosher. 

“So, I think you can see how it works.”
In 2015, the Obama administration approved a Chinese state-owned company’s 51-percent-majority purchase of Henniges, an American “dual-use” parts manufacturer involved in the production of “anti-vibration” automotive technologies with military applications. 

The deal was approved by the the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), speculated Mosher, due to a Biden-linked firm’s purchasing of the remaining 49-percent-minority stake in Henniges.

Sorbo noted how Thornton Group — a “politically connected consultancy firm” connected to Rosemont Seneca — documented its meeting in China with Hunter Biden on the Chinese-language side of its website, but omitted such details from its English-language website.
“On the Chinese side, they were happy to brag about how they had managed to win influence and buy friends in the United States, and yet their American partners were much more reticent to reveal exactly what was going on,” stated Mosher. 

“I wonder why.”
Sorbo framed Chinese purchasing of political influence as a function of a self-serving domestic political class: “This is what you get when you get a political class, an elite class, and they feel that they’re untouchable, and they’re using their political power and their access to their own benefit.”
“It’s influence peddling of the worst kind,” concurred Mosher. 

“Going back a hundred years, Warren G. Harding got in trouble because his energy secretary was dealing in oil leases. This is far worse than the kind of scandals and corruption we’ve seen in American history because it deals with a selling out America to a hostile foreign power. China does not wish us well. China wishes to replace us on the world stage, and they’re buying influence and buying companies and stealing technology piecemeal. But they have a plan. This is not happening just by chance. They’re targeting the family members of powerful influential American politicians, offering them sweetheart deals knowing that once the deal is inked that they will have that family not in their pocket necessarily, but they’ll certainly get a sympathetic hearing on any China issues that comes up.”
Mosher didn’t question Joe Biden’s patriotism, but noted that when the company or firm of a politician’s family member receives “enormous benefits from these sweetheart deals… it has to soften their views on America’s stance towards China.”
Sorbo challenged Mosher’s assessment of Biden’s intentions: “I might have a bit of a harder line than you on this, because my understanding is that Biden flew over [to China] for meetings and brought his son. So he’s the one parading his son around saying, ‘Look at my fine young man. Can you do anything for him?'”
Mosher also noted China’s efforts to influence Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and senior advisor, by offering him $600 million towards an outstanding debt on a Manhattan property owed by Kushner’s family business.
“The Chinese came in and offered [Jared Kushner] $600 million to prop up his loan for the 666 Fifth Avenue building, which is heavily in debt,” said Mosher. 

“He turned down the offer, but you can see how the Chinese are playing this game. They pick targets of opportunity. Sometimes they succeed. Sometimes they don’t, but every time they succeed they chisel away at American resolve to confront what is, after all, I think a mortal danger to the American republic, a mortal danger certainly to the rule of law in the world and the current world order.”
Peter Schweizer’s new book Secret Empires hit bookstores nationwide on Tuesday, March 20.

Kushner: The Enemy Within

KUSHNER WAS CHINA’S COMPLIANT ‘LUCKY CHARM’ 
BY JESSICA KWONG

Jared Kushner, whom Donald Trump entrusted as his chief diplomatic contact with China despite having no prior government experience, met with a Chinese ambassador alone on at least one occasion, raising security concerns among counterintelligence officials.
The president’s son-in-law and senior White House adviser met Cui Tiankai, the Chinese ambassador to the United States, during the Trump campaign and reunited with him several times during Trump’s transition and even more often in the months after Trump took office, The New Yorker reported earlier this week.
White House Senior adviser Jared Kushner attends bilateral meetings held by Donald Trump and Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People on November 9, 2017 in Beijing, China.

“Jared became Mr. China,” Michael Pillsbury, a former Pentagon aide on Trump’s transition team, told the magazine.
Kushner was China’s “lucky charm,” a former National Security Council member said. 

“It was a dream come true. They couldn’t believe he was so compliant.”
Cui, who during previous administrations was received at the White House with a group of China experts and note-takers, often got to meet with Kushner without the U.S. government’s top China specialists.
Some officials, who were not invited nor briefed on the meetings with Cui, were left to comb through American intelligence documents in order to get a sense of how Chinese diplomats described interactions with Kushner. 

That is unusual because officials typically sit in on meetings with representatives of foreign countries for national security purposes.
“There’s nobody else there in the room to verify what was said and what wasn’t, so the Chinese can go back and claim anything,” a former senior U.S. official briefed on the meetings told The New Yorker. 

“I’m sorry, Jared—do you think your background is going to allow you to be able to outsmart the Chinese Ambassador?”

A spokesman for Kushner said that China specialists did not tell him that “he shouldn’t be doing it the way he was doing it at the time.”
Within the intelligence community, China‘s influence operations are of equal concern as those of Russia.
Counterintelligence officials warned Kushner last year that his wife Ivanka Trump’s best friend, Wendi Deng Murdoch, could be using her friendship with them to benefit the Chinese government, The Wall Street Journal reported last week.
Kushner’s portfolio—which when he moved into the West Wing early last year also included rewriting the U.S.’s trade agreements and forging peace in the Middle East—has been reduced, and he no longer meets with Cui frequently.

The Godfather's Daughter

Ivanka Trump's China business ties are more secret than ever

• Public information about the companies importing Ivanka Trump goods to the U.S. has become harder to find.
• Information that once routinely appeared in private trade tracking data has vanished, leaving the identities of companies involved in 90 percent of shipments unknown.
• The deepening secrecy means it's unclear who Ivanka Trump's company is doing business within China.

AP

Ivanka Trump attends Donald Trump's strategy and policy forum with chief executives of major U.S. companies at the White House in Washington, February 3, 2017.
It is no secret that the bulk of Ivanka Trump's merchandise comes from China. 

But just which Chinese companies manufacture and export her handbags, shoes, and clothes is more secret than ever, an Associated Press investigation has found.
In the months since she took her White House role, public information about the companies importing Ivanka Trump goods to the U.S. has become harder to find. 

Information that once routinely appeared in private trade tracking data has vanished, leaving the identities of companies involved in 90 percent of shipments unknown. 

Even less is known about her manufacturers. 

Trump's brand, which is still owned by the first daughter and presidential adviser, declined to disclose the information.
The deepening secrecy means it's unclear who Ivanka Trump's company is doing business within China, even as she and her husband, Jared Kushner, have emerged as important conduits for top Chinese officials in Washington. 

The lack of disclosure makes it difficult to understand whether foreign governments could use business ties with her brand to try to influence the White House — and whether her company stands to profit from foreign government subsidies that can destroy American jobs. 

Such questions are especially pronounced in China, where state-owned and state-subsidized companies dominate large swaths of commercial activity.
"There should be more transparency, but right now we do not have the legal mechanism to enforce transparency unless Congress requests information through a subpoena," said Richard Painter, who served as chief White House ethics lawyer for George W. Bush, and is part of a lawsuit against Donald Trump for constitutional violations. 

"I don't know how much money she's making on this and why it's worth it. I think it's putting our trade policy in a very awkward situation."
An AP review of the records that are available about Ivanka Trump's supply chain found two potential red flags. 

In one case, a province in eastern China announced the award of export subsidies to a company that shipped thousands of Ivanka Trump handbags between March 2016 and February of this year, Chinese public records show — a violation by China of global fair trade rules, trade experts said.

Workers on a production line at the Huajian shoe factory, where about 100,000 pairs of Ivanka Trump-branded shoes have been made over the years amongst other brands, in Dongguan, in south China's Guangdong province.

The AP also found that tons of Ivanka Trump clothing were exported from 2013 to 2015 by a company owned by the Chinese government, according to public records and trade data. 

It is unclear whether the brand is still working with that company, or other state-owned entities. 

Her brand has pledged to avoid business with state-owned companies now that she's a White House adviser, but contends that its supply chains are not its direct responsibility.
Ivanka Trump's brand doesn't actually make its products directly. 

Instead, it contracts with licensees who oversee production of her merchandise. 

In exchange, those licensees pay the brand royalties. 

The AP asked Ivanka Trump's brand for a list of its suppliers. 

The company declined to disclose them. 

The clothing, footwear and handbag licensees contacted by AP also declined to reveal source factories.
Abigail Klem, president of IT Operations, which manages Ivanka Trump's brand, said the company does not contract with foreign state-owned companies or benefit from Chinese government subsidies. However, she acknowledged that its licensees might.
"We license the rights to our brand name to licensing companies that have their own supply chains and distribution networks," Klem said in an email. 

"The brand receives royalties on sales to wholesalers and would not benefit if a licensee increased its profit margin by obtaining goods at a lower cost," she added.
But Michael Stone, chairman of Beanstalk, a global brand licensing agency, said lower production costs for licensees would ultimately benefit Ivanka Trump by freeing up money for marketing or lower retail prices, both of which drive sales.
"It gives her a competitive advantage and an indirect benefit to her financially," Stone said. 

"The more successful the licensee is the more successful Ivanka Trump is going to be."
The AP identified companies that sent Ivanka Trump products to the United States by looking at shipment data maintained by ImportGenius and Panjiva Inc., private companies that independently track global trade. 

Panjiva's records show that 85 percent of shipments of her goods to the U.S. this year originated in China and Hong Kong, but beyond that, it's becoming more difficult to map the brand's global footprint.
The companies that shipped Ivanka Trump merchandise to the U.S. are listed for just five of 57 shipments logged by Panjiva from the end of March, when she officially became a presidential adviser, through mid-September. 

Panjiva collects data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which did not immediately release the missing data to AP.
While in many cases the manufacturer ships goods directly, merchandise can also be made by one company and shipped by another trading or consolidation company.
There used to be more visibility. 

Last year, 27 percent of the companies that exported Ivanka Trump merchandise to the U.S. were identified in Panjiva's records, and back in 2014 a full 95 percent were named. 

For two of Ivanka Trump's licensees — G-III Apparel and Marc Fisher Footwear — the number of shipments appears to plunge in 2015, likely because they "requested to hide" their shipment activity, according to Panjiva records. 

Neither company responded to AP's questions.
The brand declined to comment on the growing murkiness of its supply chain.
Chris Rogers, an analyst at Panjiva, said any company can ask customs authorities to redact its information for any reason. 

About a quarter of companies request anonymity, he said, but the majority don't mind disclosing who they're doing business with.
"A lot of companies have said, 'yes there might be a commercial disadvantage, but we want to be transparent about our supply chain,'" he explained. 

"'Why would we want to cover up the fact that we're working with this particular company?'"
While ethics lawyers may see disclosure as the best antidote to conflict of interest, many brands see it as a tool to keep supply chains scandal-free. 

Public outcry over sweatshop conditions and worker suicides prompted companies like Nike Inc. and Apple Inc. to disclose the names and addresses of their manufacturers, and a growing number, including Gap Inc., the H&M Group, New Balance Athletics Inc., Adidas AG and Levi Strauss & Co., publicly identify their suppliers.
Ivanka Trump should do the same, said Allen Adamson, founder and CEO of BrandSimple Consulting. 

"It's a missed opportunity to lead by example."
What shipping records do show is that a company called Zhejiang Tongxiang Foreign Trade Group Co. Ltd., a sprawling conglomerate once majority-owned by the Chinese state, sent at least 30 tons of Ivanka Trump handbags to the U.S. between March 2016 and February 2017.

People walk past the 'Ivanka Trump Collection' shop in the lobby at Trump Tower in New York.
Zhejiang province's commerce department said in June 2014 that it would help lower export costs for that same company, along with nine other local enterprises, through a special three-year trade promotion program. 

Among the measures outlined were export insurance subsidies and funding for online trading platforms and international marketing, as well as special funds earmarked for foreign trade companies with large-scale, fast-growing exports.
The value of the subsidies is unclear, as are details about how the directives were implemented, but using subsidies to reduce the price of exports is considered so destructive to fair trade that the World Trade Organization generally bans the practice. 

Chinese government subsidies hurt American workers but can lower costs for U.S. companies that import made-in-China merchandise, potentially boosting their profits.

Donald Trump has called companies that benefit from foreign government subsidies "cheaters."
The AP spoke with four trade experts in the United States and China who said the Zhejiang measures appeared to violate World Trade Organization rules. 

"These are clearly export subsidies," said Gary Hufbauer, a trade expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington.
Zhejiang province's Department of Commerce and the Zhejiang Tongxiang Foreign Trade Group declined to comment.
The AP also found that from Oct. 2013 to Jan. 2015, Jiangsu High Hope International Group, a conglomerate majority-owned by the Jiangsu provincial government, shipped 45 tons of Ivanka Trump clothing to the U.S., according to records from ImportGenius and Panjiva.
High Hope told AP it had "a small number of business dealings" with Ivanka Trump licensee G-III Apparel, but declined to answer questions about whether the relationship is ongoing.
G-III, which is based in New York City, declined to respond to specific questions but said in a statement that it is "committed to legal compliance and ethical business practices in all of our operations worldwide." 

Ivanka Trump licensee Mondani Handbags & Accessories Inc., also headquartered in New York, did not respond to requests for comment.
Ivanka Trump's brand said it was in the process of reviewing its supply chains with the help of "independent experts whose mission it is to advance human rights" and emphasized that all licensees, manufacturers, subcontractors, and suppliers are required to abide by the law, as well as ethical practices set forth in a vendor code of conduct.
The AP asked to see the code of conduct, but the brand declined to share it.

China's Javanka fanatics dismayed as first daughter cancels visit

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner believed to have cancelled September trip amid cooling of relations between Washington and Beijing
By Tom Phillips in Beijing

Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump ‘were definitely talking about’ a visit to China in September, experts believe. 

‘Javanka’ fans across China had been counting the days until the power couple’s arrival.
“They’re a role model couple ... highly motivated and positive. That’s what lifts me up when I feel down,” raved Chen Bo, a media executive from the southern city of Guangzhou.
Guo Anni, a Beijing-based advertising rep, hailed Donald Trump’s eldest daughter as a paragon of female beauty and power: “I just buy Ivanka’s whole outlook on life.”
Yet this month’s hotly anticipated trip to China by the president’s daughter and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, now appears to have been scrapped, amid renewed anxieties over the state of relations between Washington and Beijing.
The September stay was conceived as a glamour-packed but intensely political tour that would pave the way for a state visit from the president himself later this year. 

But Kushner, a 36-year-old property tycoon who is among the president’s top aides, declined China’s invitation to visit, the New York Times reported this week.
Trump administration officials alleged a visit had never been scheduled and could not, therefore, have been cancelled – a claim China specialists gave short shrift.
“[That’s] BS,” said Bill Bishop, a well-connected Washington-based China expert who authors the Sinocism newsletter. 

“They were definitely talking about it.”
The White House’s interim communications chief, Hope Hicks, did not immediately respond to emailed questions about the apparently aborted Javanka visit. 

But China’s foreign ministry hinted that their arrival was not imminent. 

The trip’s cancellation will disappoint a legion of Chinese Javanka aficionados, many of them young, educated and upwardly mobile women who revere the president’s daughter in particular as a symbol of grace and drive. 

Two recent Chinese-language books – Ivanka Trump: Women, Wealth and Life and Love Yourself in Your Life: Ivanka Trump’s Law of Life – underscore the respect and affection the 35-year-old commands here.
“She is so hardworking and has such self-discipline,” enthused Zhang Xiaohang, 33, a Beijing-based masters student and devotee. 

“I know she has an unreliable dad [so] I’m curious how she has been raised so well.”
Chen Bo, 35, who runs a media startup, had planned to blog about the trip. 

Chen said Ivanka, who has three children, was “super-smart” as well as rich, independent and beautiful. 

“You’ve got to be bright to play a part in House of Cards.”
The first daughter’s husband also enjoys a Chinese following. 

“Kushner is perfect,” Chen cooed. 

“He’s got a superb nose for business, his body is in great shape for a man in his thirties and he’s not been caught up in any affairs.”
Some Chinese politicos tried to shrug off the significance of Javanka’s apparent rejection of China’s invitation. 

“It won’t affect China-US relations. [Ivanka] should never have been coming to China anyway … There isn’t a single country in the world that relies on a daughter to improve bilateral relations,” said Fudan University US expert Shen Dingli.
Shi Yinhong, an international relations specialist from Renmin University in Beijing, said that while he did not understand the motives behind the cancellation the backdrop to it was one of growing friction between the world’s top two economies: “Trump is putting constant pressure on China and threatening China over the North Korea issue, and he’s made trouble with China on trade.”
Bishop said the cancellation was a blow to Chinese diplomats who had “put a lot of effort into cultivating Javanka” hoping the celebrity couple could help stabilise US-China relations and neutralise Trump’s China-bashing tendencies.
Earlier this summer China’s ambassador to the US, Cui Tiankai, dined with the couple at Washington’s 263-room Trump International Hotel. 

In February, diplomats at China’s US embassy rolled out the red carpet for Ivanka Trump and the couple’s Mandarin-speaking daughter, Arabella.
“The Chinese really put the moves on and they can be quite charming and quite convincing when they want to be … They do believe that if the kids are on board then that is a useful thing – and they are right,” Bishop said.
Kushner, in particular, was being groomed as a key channel to the Oval Office: “The Chinese always like the Kissinger-type role, that one person they can work with, and they had really hoped it would be Jared … [But] I think they have realised the utility of Javanka is less than they originally thought … The Chinese are not as confident as they were a couple of months ago.”
The scrapping of Javanka’s trip to China has also raised questions about Trump’s own visit. 

He is still expected to visit in mid-November, after a key Communist party congress, despite festering concerns about the possibility of a major fall-out between Beijing and Washington.
However, Shi hinted that even that visit, while still “quite likely”, was no longer seen as a completely done deal. 

“Uncertainties also exist. There are ups and downs in China-US relations, and Trump, in particular, is very volatile.”

Explaining Trump’s Subservience to China

Trump’s Conflicts of Interest in China
By Carolyn Kenney and John Norris

A man reads a newspaper in Beijing, November 10, 2016.

China spots an easy mark
Before becoming the 45th president, Donald Trump’s efforts to develop businesses in China were most notable for their failures. 

A 2008 deal with the Chinese Evergrande Group to develop an office complex never came to fruition, and a 2012 deal with the electric utility State Grid Corporation of China to develop property in Beijing fell apart after State Grid was found to have been illegally using public land for the project. 

In October 2016, Chinese news media quoted Trump Hotel’s—formerly Trump Hotel Collection’s—CEO Eric Danziger telling attendees of a hospitality conference in Hong Kong that the group was still planning to open Trump hotels in 20 to 30 Chinese cities, as well as Scion—the brand Trump’s sons are planning to expand—hotels in other cities. 

These comments showed a remarkable level of ambition given Trump’s stalled efforts in China up to that time.
Indeed, Trump had tried for more than a decade to register trademarks in China to provide “construction-information,” essentially real estate agent, services in that country, only to be met with a series of unsuccessful rulings and appeals. 

Since 2005, Trump has applied for at least 130 trademarks in China, all of which—until recently—were met with zero success.
What is very important to note about China is how heavily involved the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) is in all decision-making processes, not only across all government agencies but also in the judiciary, which is not independent, as well as in state-owned enterprises, which include state-run banks. 

Regarding state-owned enterprises, Xi Jinping recently reminded these companies that the CPC has ultimate say over their decisions, stating, “Party leadership and building the role of the party are the root and soul for state-owned enterprises. The party’s leadership in state-owned enterprises is a major political principle, and that principle must be insisted on.” 

As such, any decisions made at state-owned enterprises are invariably made by the Chinese government, including decisions regarding the hiring, firing, and promotion of individuals who work in these enterprises.

Here is the danger of Trump’s conflicts of interest for the United States. 

Prior to taking office, on December 2, 2016, Trump spoke with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen on the phone in an extraordinary breach of decades of U.S. foreign policy and protocol regarding China and Taiwan. 

Shortly after the call, it emerged that the Trump Organization was reportedly exploring the expansion of its business into Taiwan, reports that the organization has denied. 

In a televised interview, the mayor of Taoyuan, Taiwan, said that he had met with a representative of the Trump Organization in September to discuss possible real estate projects, and at least one Trump employee was found to have posted that she was in Taiwan on a business trip at the time.
As summarized in an Atlantic article, “The president of the United States breached decades of international protocol created to preserve a precarious balance of power. That decision raised not only the possibility that Trump was blundering into a potential international incident but also that he may have done so in part out of consideration for his business prospects.”

And then, lo and behold, China’s approval of one of Trump’s trademark applications became official—coincidentally only a few days after Trump reversed his previous position and endorsed the “one China” policy. 

This policy effectively recognizes the People’s Republic of China as the legitimate government of the mainland territory while allowing the U.S. government to have unofficial relations with Taiwan, governed by the Republic of China. 

In March 2017, China granted preliminary approval for 38 additional Trump trademarks, applications for which had been submitted in April 2016. 

While there are conflicting views about whether the process and timing of Trump’s recent trademark approvals are suspect, the reality of the matter is that in China, every administrative or judicial decision is a political one based on the government’s preferences and priorities; courts in China are not independent, but rather they report directly to the CPC. 

Also of note here is the fact that foreign companies have historically struggled to get equal treatment under Chinese law, so decisions in favor of a foreign company are striking. 

It is hard to avoid the appearance that China was giving Trump the trademarks in exchange for a direct shift in policy. 

As another Atlantic article points out: “Each subsequent ruling in his favor will serve to remind Trump of the personal profits he could reap by improving his own personal relations with China, even if doing so leaves the American people worse off.”
And the web of conflicts and Chinese influence on Donald Trump and the Trump family extends well beyond the longstanding trademarks issue.
In February, in its first major real estate transaction after Trump’s inauguration, the Trump Organization sold a $15.8 million penthouse apartment in Trump Tower to Chinese-American business executive Xiao Yan Chen, who also goes by the name Angela Chen and has been directly linked to a front group for Chinese military intelligence through the misleadingly innocuous-sounding China Arts Foundation. 

A 2011 congressional report was quite blunt in labeling the China Arts Foundation as “a front organization for the International Liaison Department of the People’s Liberation Army’s General Political Department.” 

Chen also founded and is currently the managing director of a business consulting firm called Global Alliance Associates, which “facilitates access and establishes critical strategic relationships with the most influential public and private decision makers” in China by mobilizing its “extensive network of relationships with the highest levels of government officials—at national, regional and local levels—to facilitate immediate, efficient and skillful access into the Chinese market place.” 

Neither Chen nor the China Arts Foundation replied to requests for comment from reporters.
While Trump has removed himself from the board of directors of the corporation that runs Trump Tower, he still owns the company and thus continues to profit from it. 

This puts Trump in a position to profit from an individual—Xiao Yan Chen—who has ties to the highest echelons of the Chinese government and military and who would benefit enormously from access to the U.S. government.
Trump has been dependent on Chinese money for quite a while. 

According to an investigation by The New York Times, Trump holds 30 percent ownership of an office building in Manhattan at 1290 Avenue of the Americas, for which four lenders, including the state-owned Bank of China, provided a $950 million loan in 2012. 

Commenting on the loan, Richard Painter, George W. Bush’s chief White House ethics lawyer, stated, “Any payments from foreign governments or payments from banks controlled by foreign governments would fall under the emoluments clause. The loans from the Bank of China could be an issue.” 

The Emoluments Clause of the U.S. Constitution makes it illegal for a U.S. president to directly benefit from payments from foreign powers.
The reach of Chinese influence and money has also been linked to the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. 

In 2016, Kushner Companies, which until recently was headed by Jared Kushner, was desperate to find outside money to put into a property at 666 Fifth Avenue for which his company had paid $1.8 billion in 2007—an outlandish overpayment in light of the subsequent 2008 market crash. 

The Fifth Avenue property was badly overleveraged and risked collapsing Kushner’s entire company. Once again, Chinese money seemed eager to come to the rescue. 

Kushner began talks with the massive Chinese financial firm Anbang Insurance Group to undertake a joint venture to redevelop the Fifth Avenue property.
Anbang is one of the most aggressive Chinese buyers of U.S. real estate and has very close ties to the Chinese government. 

Its shadowy structure has caused suspicion about its real ownership and has led some U.S. firms to not work with the company because it doesn’t meet their client information guidelines. 

Anbang is headed by Wu Xiaohui, who is married to the granddaughter of former Chinese Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping.
The talks to secure the potential $4 billion deal between the Kushner and Anbang companies, however, reportedly ended a few days after Democratic lawmakers wrote letters to the Office of the White House Counsel and the treasury secretary expressing ethical and legal concerns over the deal. A Kushner spokesman declined to comment further to reporters about the deal ending.
And while Kushner has now stepped down from the Kushner family business, he will still be a beneficiary of much of the business through his trusts. 

The reverse is true as well: It appears that the family is trying to cash in on Jared Kushner’s new role as a White House senior adviser. 

According to The Washington Post, representatives from Kushner Companies, including Jared’s sister Nicole Kushner Meyer, recently gave a presentation to Chinese citizens in Beijing encouraging them to each invest $500,000 in the family’s Trump-branded New Jersey luxury apartment complex in exchange for an EB-5 immigrant investor visa. 

Known in China as the “golden visa,” the immigrant investor visa allows wealthy foreigners who provide large amounts of funding to U.S. projects that create jobs to apply for a visa and immigrate to the United States. 

As reported by Bloomberg, prior to taking on his role in the White House, Jared Kushner had raised $50 million from Chinese immigrant investor visa applicants for the New Jersey project. 

Ethics experts, including Painter, criticized the event, with Painter noting in a Washington Post article that the company “clearly impl[ies] that the Kushners are going to make sure you get your visa. … They’re [Chinese applicants] not going to take a chance. Of course they’re going to want to invest.” The Kushner company spokesperson declined to comment on the Post’s story.
The Chinese Communist Party’s links to Trump go even further. 

In 2008, the state-controlled Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC)—which reports to the CPC and is currently the world’s largest lender—signed a lease for the 20th floor in Trump Tower in New York City. 

The lease is slated to end in October 2019, meaning that a new lease will have to be negotiated while Trump is in office if the ICBC decides to renew. 

According to Bloomberg, the latest available data from Wells Fargo filings show that as of 2012, the ICBC was Trump Tower’s biggest office tenant, taking up 11 percent of its office space, and was paying more than any other major tenant in Trump Tower at $95.48 per square foot. 

According to data from CoStar Group, the deal has been worth more than $1.5 million annually to the Trump Organization. 

Many see the relationship between Trump and the ICBC as already violating the Emoluments Clause of the constitution, while others view it as a potential area for future violations of the clause, notably if Trump receives payments from the ICBC that are above market value.
In addition, the China Export and Credit Insurance Corporation, a state-controlled company in China also known as Sinosure, is investing $425 million in one of Trump’s resorts in Indonesia, specifically for a theme park to be built by another Chinese state-owned company.
And, not surprisingly, Ivanka Trump also seems to be suddenly benefitting from all this newfound Chinese largesse. 

On the very same day that Trump and Ivanka met with Xi Jinping, China preliminarily approved three new trademarks for Ivanka’s brand to cover jewelry, bags, and a spa service.
Since Trump’s inauguration, Ivanka Trump Marks LLC has been granted preliminary approval of at least five trademarks in China, bringing the total number of registered trademarks for the company to 16, with 30 pending applications. 

While Ivanka no longer manages her brand, she still owns it. 

In an attempt to address potential conflict of interest issues, she put her brand’s assets in a family-run trust, which is worth more than $50 million, and pledged to recuse herself from issues that might present conflicts.
Conflict of interest laws bar federal officials, such as Ivanka and her husband, from participating in government affairs that could potentially impact their own financial interests or those of their spouses—a standard that they seem to not be meeting by any fair reading. 

Ivanka’s lawyer, Jamie Gorelick, has stated that Ivanka and her husband would avoid specific areas that could impact her business and be seen as conflicts of interest but that they are not under a legal obligation to step back from large areas of policy, such as trade with China. 

Gorelick also noted that Ivanka would recuse herself from conversations pertaining to duties levied on clothing imported from China but not on broad foreign policy.
In an example that highlights the potential dangers of these conflicts, The Guardian recently reported that a labour rights activist who was working undercover to investigate abuses at a Chinese factory producing Ivanka Trump-brand shoes is being held by police and two other labor activists were missing, “raising concerns the company’s ties to the US president’s family may have led to harsher treatment.” 

The executive director of the group investigating the factory, Li Qiang, said that the missing activists were preparing to publicly allege labor violations at the factory, “including paying below China’s legal minimum wage, managers verbally abusing workings and ‘violations of women’s rights.’” 

Li noted that he had contacted the Ivanka Trump brand about the violations on April 27 to request that the brand call on suppliers to comply with Chinese law but did not see evidence that any changes were made. 

The Ivanka Trump brand declined to comment to The Guardian, and calls to the factory owner went unanswered.

Follow the paper trail
According to Trump’s July 2015 financial disclosure—which was not verified by regulators and therefore may not include all of his foreign deals or assets—Trump owned, had ownership interest in, or was a managing member of several companies related to potential business in China, including the following:

• THC China Development LLC, president. Value: $100,001 to $250,000. Income amount: “None (or less than $201)”
• THC China Development Management Corp., chairman, director, president
• THC China Technical Services LLC, member, president
• THC China Technical Services Manager Corp., chairman, director, president
• THC Services Shenzen LLC, member, president
• THC Services Shenzen Member Corp., chairman, director, president
• THC Shenzen Hotel Manager LLC, member, president
• THC Shenzen Hotel Manager Member Corp., chairman, director, president

According to Trump’s May 2016 financial disclosure—which also was not verified by regulators and therefore may not include all of his foreign deals or assets—Trump owned, had ownership interest in, or was a managing member of several companies related to potential business in China, including the following:

• China Trademark LLC, member, president
• THC China Development LLC, president. Value: $1,001 to $15,000. Income amount: “None (or less than $201)”
• THC China Development Management Corp., chairman, director, president
• THC China Technical Services LLC, member, president
• THC China Technical Services Manager Corp., chairman, director, president
• THC Services Shenzen LLC, member, president
• THC Services Shenzen Member Corp., chairman, director, president
• THC Shenzen Hotel Manager LLC, member, president
• THC Shenzen Hotel Manager Member Corp., chairman, director, president

All of these obvious conflicts of interest should give Americans pause. 

If Donald Trump negotiates a trade deal with China, will he accept terms that will cost American workers jobs but help his hotel brand? 

If China makes aggressive military moves in Asia, will Trump fail to effectively respond because he is worried about jeopardizing his daughter’s trademarks in Beijing or losing Chinese financing for his properties? 

Americans can have no confidence that Trump’s decisions aren’t being driven by his business interests in China when he won’t release his tax returns. 

Already Trump has shown a pattern of backing down in the face of Chinese demands, as shown by his abrupt shift on the “one China” policy at  Xi Jinping’s request. 

When trying to explain Trump’s new subservience to China, one need look no further than his business interests.

The Chinese Connection

Arrested, missing China activists spark criticism of Trump

By ERIKA KINETZ

China Labor Watch investigator Hua Haifeng
SHANGHAI — The arrest and disappearance of three labor activists investigating a Chinese company that produces Ivanka Trump shoes in China prompted a call for her brand to stop working with the supplier and raised questions about whether the first family’s commercial interests would muddy U.S. leadership on human rights.
“Ivanka’s brand should immediately cease its work with this supplier, and the Trump administration should reverse its current course and confront China on its human rights abuses,” Adrienne Watson, spokeswoman for the Democratic National Committee, said in a Wednesday email. 

Ivanka Trump must decide, she added, “whether she can ignore the Chinese government’s apparent attempt to silence an investigation into those worker abuses.”
Amnesty International called Wednesday for the release of China Labor Watch investigator Hua Haifeng, as well as his two colleagues, who are feared to have been detained.
The men were working with an American nonprofit group to publish a report next month alleging low pay, excessive overtime and misuse of student labor, according to China Labor Watch executive director Li Qiang, who lost contact with the investigators over the weekend. 

The investigators also witnessed verbal abuse, with one manager insulting staff about poorly made shoes and making a crude reference in Chinese to female genitalia, according to Mr. Li.
China Labor Watch has been exposing poor working conditions at suppliers to some of the world’s best-known companies for nearly two decades, but Mr. Li said his work has never before attracted this level of scrutiny from China’s state security apparatus.
The arrest and disappearances come amid a crackdown on perceived threats to the stability of China’s ruling Communist Party, particularly from sources with foreign ties such as China Labor Watch. Faced with rising labor unrest and a slowing economy, Beijing has taken a stern approach to activism in southern China’s manufacturing belt and to human rights advocates generally, sparking a wave of critical reports about disappearances, public confessions, forced repatriation and torture in custody.
China Labor Watch’s investigation also had an unusual target: a brand owned by the daughter of the president of the United States.
Ivanka Trump’s lifestyle brand imports most of its merchandise from China, trade data show. 

She and her father both have extensive trademark portfolios in China, though neither has managed to build up a large retail or real estate presence here. 

The sister of Jared Kushner, a Trump adviser and husband of Ivanka, traveled to China this past month to court investment from Chinese families for a real estate project in New Jersey.
“The eagerness of members of the family to do business in China while airbrushing very troubling human rights and labor rights records of the country is troubling,” said Nicholas Bequelin, East Asia director for Amnesty International. 

He said it is only a matter of time before it is known “to what extent business is trumping any kind of consideration of the diplomatic capital of the U.S. in promoting human rights, labor rights and democracy.”
White House spokeswoman Hope Hicks referred questions to Trump’s brand. 

The Ivanka Trump brand declined to comment.
Abigail Klem, who took over day-to-day management when the first daughter became a White House presidential adviser, has said the brand requires licensees and their manufacturers to “comply with all applicable laws and to maintain acceptable working conditions.”
China tightened control over foreign NGOs starting this year by requiring them to register with state security. 

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a regular news briefing Wednesday that she was not aware of the arrest and disappearances. 

She said China welcomed international NGOs to carry out research, but added, “we also hope that NGOs can also observe Chinese laws and regulations and don’t engage in any illegal actions or behavior.”
Mr. Hua was accused of illegal surveillance, according to his wife, Ms. Deng Guilian, who said the police called her Tuesday afternoon. 

Ms. Deng said the caller told her she didn’t need to know the details, only that she would not be able to see, speak with or receive money from her husband, the family’s breadwinner. 

The crime carries a penalty of up to two years’ imprisonment.
Mr. Li said China Labor Watch asked police about Mr. Hua and the two other investigators, Li Zhao and Su Heng, on Monday but received no reply.
The Associated Press was unable to reach the other investigators’ families. 

China’s Ministry of Public Security and police could not be reached for comment Tuesday, which was a national holiday in China. 

Calls went unanswered Wednesday morning.
The men were investigating Huajian Group factories in the southern Chinese cities of Ganzhou and Dongguan. 

Ms. Su had been working undercover at the Ganzhou factory since April, Mr. Li said.
In January, Liu Shiyuan, then spokesman for the Huajian Group, told the AP that the company makes 10,000 to 20,000 pairs of shoes a year for Ms. Trump’s brand — a fraction of the 20 million pairs the company produces a year. 

A current spokeswoman for the company, Long Shan, did not reply to questions Tuesday or Wednesday morning.
Mr. Li said investigators had seen Ivanka Trump-brand merchandise, as well as production orders for Ivanka Trump, Marc Fisher, Nine West and Easy Spirit.
“We were unaware of the allegations and will look into them immediately,” a spokeswoman for Marc Fisher, which manufactures Ivanka Trump, Easy Spirit and its own branded shoes, said in an email Tuesday. 

Nine West did not respond to requests for comment.

Talis pater, qualis filia

IVANKA TRUMP PROFITS FROM UNDERPAID WORKERS IN CHINA
BY MICHELE GORMAN 

While Donald Trump has long railed against China for stealing U.S. jobs, his eldest daughter’s apparel brand allegedly has been profiting from workers earning just $1 an hour, Bloomberg reported this week.
On the campaign trail, candidate Trump repeatedly used the “Buy American” slogan. 

In a national address that was reminiscent of his campaign speeches, Trump at his inauguration promised to put “America first.” 

He vowed to bring to the U.S. more jobs, strong borders and greater wealth, and to benefit American workers with his decisions on trade, taxes and immigration.

Donald Trump and his daughter Ivanka hold a video conference call from the Oval Office of the White House on April 24. The Ivanka Trump brand has come under fire for allegedly underpaying workers at two Chinese factories, according to a report.

Meanwhile, China Labor Watch tells Newsweek it has investigated two factories in China that produce items for the Ivanka Trump fashion line. 

On April 27, the nonprofit sent her a letter addressing its concerns. 

“The working hours run 12.5 hours, meaning four to five hours of overtime work every day,” Li Qiang, founder of China Labor Watch, tells Newsweek. 

“Some workers receive less than a dollar per hour, which is lower than the labor standard stipulated by law.” 

These hours equate to a monthly salary of about $363.
“We are waiting for Ivanka Trump’s reply,” Qiang says. 

“We plan to issue the report in June.”
Last month, The Washington Post reported on a factory audit that found dozens of workers endured long hours and minimal pay in a factory used by Trump’s brand.
A spokesperson for the brand didn’t immediately respond to Newsweek’s request for additional comment Thursday. 

Abigail Klem, president of the Ivanka Trump brand, defended its labor standards in a statement to Bloomberg, saying it’s “impossible for us to respond to allegations, with no supporting evidence, concerning an unnamed factory.”
Just days after her father’s inauguration, Trump announced she would step down from her fashion label. 

She has since joined her father's administration as an assistant to the president, and thus is now a federal employee with an office in the White House. 

She and husband, Jared Kushner, another White House adviser, are expected to join the president for parts of his upcoming trip to the Middle East.
This isn’t the first time Trump’s brand has been a topic of concern during her father’s presidency. White House aide Kellyanne Conway apparently was rebuked by government officials in February after she pitched Trump’s products on a nationally televised show. 

During an interview on Fox & Friends, Conway encouraged Americans to “go buy Ivanka’s stuff.... It’s a wonderful line.”

Banana Republic

Chasing After the Kushners in China
By JAVIER C. HERNÁNDEZ

Jared Kushner’s sister Nicole Meyer (third from left) urged wealthy Chinese in Shanghai on May 7 to invest in a Kushner Companies luxury apartment complex in New Jersey.

BEIJING — The tip came in the form of an advertisement posted in the elevator of a Beijing apartment building.
“New Jersey Central Tower,” it said above a rendering of a gleaming housing complex. 

“Government supports, star family builds.”
The “star family” referred to relatives of Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser.

The ad gave the details of a meeting at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Beijing where investors would learn how they could obtain permanent residence in the United States by investing $500,000 in a project called “Kushner1.”
On Saturday, May 6, I showed up at a ballroom in the Ritz-Carlton, doing my best to blend in with a crowd of Chinese investors.
After about a half-hour, the keynote speaker took the stage: Nicole Meyer, Kushner’s sister and a leader of Kushner Companies, the family real estate business.
I listened attentively, jotting down her opening words: “This project means a lot to me and my entire family.” 

But about a minute into her speech, a public relations executive blocked my view.
“This is a private event,” she said. 

“I have to let you go. We don’t want to make a scene.”
I noted that the meeting had been publicly advertised. (A colleague in the Beijing bureau of The Times, Jonathan Ansfield, had spotted the notice inside the compound where he lives.)

But it was clear that the handlers were going to block me from hearing the rest of Meyer’s remarks. 

I left the ballroom, but my colleague Cao Li, a journalist in the Beijing bureau of The Times, managed to stay inside for a few more minutes.
Outside the ballroom, a team of about half a dozen public relations executives and security officials grew hostile, threatening to take us into a private room. 

They followed us throughout the hotel, trying to discourage investors from speaking out.
As journalists in China, we are accustomed to dealing with harassment. 

But we don’t typically encounter bullying at events where American companies hold court.
After the meeting, we ran after Meyer, asking whether she worried her business activities in China might create ethical issues for her brother. 

She wouldn’t answer but tried to calm down her irritated husband, Joseph Meyer, chairman and publisher of Observer Media, who shouted three times, “Please leave us alone!”
Later that evening, we broke news that Meyer had dropped her brother’s name and his White House role during her sales pitch at the Ritz-Carlton.

In the days that followed, Kushner Companies apologized; U.S. senators called for an end to the investor visa program that the company was using; and the mayor of Jersey City, N.J., where the housing development is expected to be built, said he opposed tax breaks for the company.
By Friday, Kushner Companies seemed to have grown tired of the controversy. 

The company announced that Meyer and other executives would leave China early, withdrawing from the rest of their roadshow.

Banana Republic

Kushner Companies EB-5 Activities in China Constitute Securities Fraud
BY GARY CHODOROW

As has been widely reported, Kushner Companies recently put on a roadshow to market to Chinese investors a New Jersey real estate project called One Journal Square. 

The investments are structured such that investors may qualify for green cards through the EB-5 program, which requires a minimum $500,000 investment resulting in the creation of at least 10 U.S. jobs.
Initial reporting about the roadshow led the Kushner Companies to apologize last week for boasting about their ties to White House adviser Jared Kushner during the roadshow. 

“In a sector where investors are wary of failing projects and policy changes that would jeopardize their visas,” writes Alexandra Harney for Reuters, such boasts are meant to “reassure potential investors their EB-5 projects will be successful.”
Reuters is now reporting that Kushner Companies’ activities may have crossed the line from boasting to misrepresentation, making the company vulnerable to charges of securities fraud by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 

Specifically, advertisements by the company’s marketing agent in China contain multiple misrepresentations about the safety of the investment.
Kushner Companies’ marketing agent, QWOS Group, also known as Qiaowai, produced an online advertisement claiming that the investment “in a real sense guarantees a permanent green card and the safety of the investment principal.” 

After Reuters asked Qiaowai for comment, the advertisement was deleted. 

Other advertisements for the project made similar false claims.
The SEC enforces Section 10(b) of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, and Rule 10b-5, codified at 17 C.F.R. 240.10b-5, which target securities fraud. 

EB-5 investments are frequently structured as a type of “security” subject to the antifraud provisions of federal securities laws, according to SEC congressional testimony. 

Rule 10b-5 makes it unlawful to “make any untrue statement of a material fact or to omit to state a material fact necessary in order to make the statements made, in the light of the circumstances under which they were made, not misleading.”
Qiaowai’s advertisements violate the rule in two ways. 

1. First, EB-5 investments are financially risky, not guaranteed. The immigration law specifically prohibits investments where the money is not at risk. 
2. Second, there is no guarantee that an investor will actually get a green card. There are a host of reasons why an investor could be denied a green card. 

Some are related to the investor, such as health issues, membership in the Communist Party, inability to prove that the funds invested were earned legally, prior U.S. immigration violations, etc. 

Some are related to the project, such as failure to employ the required number of U.S. workers, or delays or changes to the project.
In a jointly issued Investor Alert, USCIS and SEC warn against precisely these types of misrepresentation:
Beware if you spot any of these hallmarks of fraud:
Promises of a visa or becoming a lawful permanent resident. 

Investing through EB-5 makes you eligible to apply for a conditional visa, but there is no guarantee that USCIS will grant you a conditional visa or subsequently remove the conditions on your lawful permanent residency. 

USCIS carefully reviews each case and denies cases where eligibility rules are not met. 

Guarantees of the receipt or timing of a visa or green card are warning signs of fraud.
Guaranteed investment returns or no investment risk. 

Money invested through EB-5 must be at risk for the purpose of generating a return. 

If you are guaranteed investment returns or told you will get back a portion of the money you invested, be suspicious.
Kushner Companies may not be shielded from liability just because they hired Qiaowai rather than doing the marketing themselves. 

They may be liable for the actions of their agents, sometimes referred to in the industry as “finders.” Securities lawyers advise that developers should know the parties marketing their deal abroad. 

The best practice is to have a clear agreement with the agent in which the agent agrees to comply with securities laws and to provide all marketing materials to the developer’s securities counsel for review before publication.
The SEC did not respond to questions by Reuters about Qiaowai’s ads.
Besides the One Journal Square project, Qiaowai previously helped the Kushner Companies raise funds for Trump Bay Street, an apartment complex in Jersey City, New Jersey, that The Trump Organization licensed its name to.

Banana Republic

Kushner Companies Backs Out of Chinese Investor Events After Furor
By JAVIER C. HERNÁNDEZ

Nicole Meyer, a sister of the senior White House adviser Jared Kushner, at a promotional event in Shanghai on Sunday. Critics pointed to the roadshow, which sought to solicit $150 million in financing for a Jersey City housing development, as an example of the conflicts of interest in the Trump administration.

BEIJING — The real estate company owned by the family of Jared Kushner, son-in-law and senior adviser to Trump, said on Friday that its employees would no longer take part in a cross-country roadshow in China this month.
Executives from Kushner Companies, including Nicole Meyer, Kushner’s sister, were expected to appear in the southern cities of Shenzhen and Guangzhou and the central city of Wuhan this month, according to ads for the events.
But after an uproar, the company and its Chinese partner said on Friday that Kushner Companies would no longer be present at those events, although it will continue to actively court investors.
The company is seeking $150 million in financing for a New Jersey housing development through a program that gives foreigners who invest at least $500,000 a shot at green cards, which allow permanent residence in the United States. 

The overall sum represents about 15 percent of the total cost of the property project.

But the effort to raise money in China drew widespread criticism, with ethics experts saying it presented a conflict of interest. 

Kushner continues to benefit from a stake in his family’s real estate business and other investments worth as much as $600 million.

On Friday, Risa B. Heller, a spokeswoman for Kushner Companies, said its employees would no longer participate in the roadshow after taking part in meetings in Beijing and Shanghai last weekend.
“No one from Kushner Companies will be in China this weekend,” she said in a statement, which was earlier reported by The Washington Post.
The Chinese partner of Kushner Companies, an immigration agency named Qiaowai, said on Friday that the meetings this month would go forward, but that no one from Kushner Companies would attend. 

Qiaowai had marketed the Kushner family’s visit as a five-city tour over two weeks, ending in Wuhan. 

The Chinese firm will still give presentations on the New Jersey project, field questions on the investor visa program and solicit investments.
Meyer added a star turn to efforts by Kushner Companies to raise money in China. 

Kushner is married to Trump’s elder daughter, Ivanka. 

Since Trump took office in January, fascination with his family has grown in China, especially as Kushner has become a power broker in relations between Washington and Beijing.
Speaking at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Beijing on Saturday, Meyer said the New Jersey project, called One Journal Square, “means a lot to me and my entire family.” 

She said Kushner, who resigned as chief executive of the company in January, was now serving in the White House.
Meyer’s remarks drew intense backlash in the United States, with critics seizing on the roadshow as a stark example of the conflicts of interest in Trump’s White House.
The company later apologized, saying Meyer did not intend to use her brother’s name to lure investors. 

Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, said Kushner was in compliance with ethics rules and had “nothing to do” with the company’s work in China.
Adding to the fallout, the mayor of Jersey City, N.J., where One Journal Square is set to be built, said on Sunday that he opposed the Kushner family’s request for hefty tax breaks for the project.
The roadshow also raised questions about the investor visa program known as EB-5, which has been plagued by fraud and abuse scandals and is likely to be overhauled this year.
Even in China, where business and politics often mix, there was a hint of indignation. 

State-run news media published reports asking whether the company was benefiting from unfair competition.
“Caution urged on Kushner project,” read a headline in the Global Times newspaper.
But Hao Junbo, a lawyer in Beijing, said Meyer’s emphasis on family connections would probably prove to be a winning message in China.
“Chinese people have a tradition of worshiping powerful officials,” he said. 

“It’s an innate attraction to Chinese investors. They will automatically label the program as one with official backing after they hear the name of Trump’s son-in-law.”

Chinese Connection

America’s Princeling: Why China Loves Jared Kushner
The Kushner family real-estate empire, including a Trump-branded tower, was built with money from rich Chinese buying ‘investment’ visas to the United States.

By Sarah Rogers

HONG KONG—Chinese consumers are a finicky bunch. 

Plenty of American businesses have attempted to break into China, but a mixture of cross-cultural flops, unpredictable and rapid changes in tastes, and tight government regulation has brought down the likes of Home Depot and Best Buy, and thwarted the global domination of tech giants like Facebook and Google.
But when Nicole Meyer, who is a sister of Donald J. Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, played up her relationship with her brother—a flagrant wink-wink-nudge-nudge using the the cachet of the White House—she was tapping into China’s strange Trump love, and something more.
The connections that Meyer was evoking in front of 100 potential investors and clients in Beijing’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel were obvious to the well-heeled men and women there. 

She is the sister of an American princeling, the sort of position that is bestowed on a limited few based on their family connections rather than actual achievements—and should they hand over some money to the Kushner family, successful entry to the U.S. would be guaranteed.
The whole Meyer/Kushner pitch aligns with what the Chinese know about their own ruling party’s “royalty,” where the princelings (and princesslings) have been opting for jobs in the private sector, leveraging family connections as part of the political elite.
Just last year, JP Morgan Chase was fined $264 million by U.S. regulators for hiring Chinese princelings, a move that was meant to bolster the bank’s business in the Asia-Pacific region, but was also a violation of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
Meyer, as you’ll recall, touted the property dubbed One Journal Square in New Jersey as something desirable for wealthy Chinese individuals, stating bluntly that they would be awarded with fast-track immigration processing as long as they “invested” $500,000 in the United States.
The visa program, called EB-5, is an attractive channel for Chinese citizens who want to launder cash outside their homeland. 

There are multiple reasons for choosing to do this—some are looking for ways to bypass the strict banking controls that are in place in China; others want to live in a place where dirty air, dodgy food, talk of war on their doorstep, dubious “confessions,” and spy-related paranoia are no longer part of the everyday experience.
Some others, a rare few, are merely after better pre-collegiate education options for their children, going to the lengths of uprooting the entire family to get to the USA.
The Kushner real-estate empire is making a play to profit from those insecurities, in turn exploiting the EB-5 investor visa program.
This particular immigration procedure is, bluntly, a means for rich folks to acquire American residency. 

While other means of settling in the U.S. might involve a mountain of paperwork, the only kind of paper required under EB-5, to all intents and purposes, is the greenback.
All this is well known to Trump, who re-upped the EB-5 program a few days ago. 

Indeed, as Bloomberg reported last year, when Kushner Companies (then-CEO: Jared Kushner) were building Trump Bay Street in New Jersey, the firm they hired to attract investors circulated a video touting the EB-5 benefits to be had by buying there.
According to State Department statistics (PDF), 7,516 mainland-born Chinese were allocated EB-5 visas last year—the lion’s share. 

The second-most numerous national group were Vietnam-born persons: They acquired 334 visas under the same program. 

Here are a few more numbers: In 2005, the program granted only 350 visas in total; in 2007, 700 visas were issued; in 2014, EB-5 reached its quota of 10,000 for the first time ever. 

The numbers speak for themselves: The program is now skewed heavily to benefit Chinese investors.
For a time, Donald J. Trump was the xenophobe’s candidate of choice, as cries of “Build that wall!” reverberated at rallies and claims that the man “beat China all the time” fueled news cycles. 

But Trump has turned the tables.
With Jared Kushner’s name showing up in Beijing during a shameless sales pitch, drawing a direct line between his name and a problematic visa program that has been riddled with fraud, even bringing potentially corrupt money into America, the first family of America is now stained with another shade of embarrassment.
That Jared Kushner was officially absorbed into the Trump administration as a senior adviser—and Middle East peace broker, shadow diplomat, and the person to reinvent government, among other labors—only makes the Kushner family’s wanton cash-grab in China appear even more unprincipled.
No doubt the Kushner family knew before their sales pitch in Beijing that there would be fallout—in the West—if only in the form of a tarnished brand image. 

But a bit of bad press at home is merely the cost of doing business, one that carries negligible impact in hard-currency revenue.
On Sunday, Kushner Companies was quick to issue a statement to The Washington Post saying that it “apologizes if that mention of [Meyer’s] brother was in any way interpreted as an attempt to lure investors. That was not Meyer’s intention.” 

The firm then went on to emphasize that the real-estate project would provide $180 million in tax revenue in the next 30 years.
Right now, when there are major seismic waves hitting Washington, D.C. 

With the Russia probe only in its inception, and the termination of FBI Director James Comey leaving many wondering what will come next, one must ask: When will the Trump and Kushner families’ ties with China be examined in detail?
One might recall that on the day Trump met with Xi Jinping at Mar-al-Mago, Ivanka Trump secured China trademarks for her clothing, jewelry, and accessories brand.
So far, no one in the Trump-Kushner circuit has been held accountable. 

But it could hardly be more obvious that the family of a presidential candidate who failed to win a majority vote in America is profiting massively from their position.
The people of the United States might someday focus on this, and might someday care. 

But the Chinese? 

They know about princelings and princesslings, and working with them is just what one might call the art of the deal.