During a Monday appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” economic analyst Steve Rattner astounded the show hosts with a graph illustrating the rapid accumulation of funds by Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner for his hedge fund in the half-year following his departure from the White House. The crux of the matter lay in the inquiries raised about the origins of Kushner’s considerable windfall amounting to $3.1 billion.
Within the segment, Rattner exhibited a visual representation depicting a meager one percent stemming from American investors, in stark contrast to the substantial proportion originating from Middle Eastern interests. The analyst emphasized that these statistics should undoubtedly provoke scrutiny, posing the question of what precisely Kushner was engaged in while ostensibly serving as an advisor to Donald Trump for the betterment of America.
“He worked in the White House and worked very hard, it is less clear what he worked hard at, because after he left the White House, he raised $3.1 billion — that’s billion with a ‘b’ — for a private equity fund and he is not a private equity guy, he is a real estate guy,” Rattner explained. “So where does the money come from? We know that he raised $3.1 billion and only about $30 million of it actually came from investors in the United States all the rest of it is foreign money. And of that foreign money, $2 billion came from the Saudis.”
Drawing from his extensive four-decade-long experience in the field, Rattner remarked on the unprecedented nature of a situation where one investor, in this case, the Saudis, contributes a substantial two-thirds of the total funds.
“I’ve been in this business 40 years, I’ve never seen somebody get two-thirds of their money from a single investor. Usually a single investor might be a few percent of the fund, might be 5 percent, maybe 10 percent — you never see this. Another $200 million we believe came from Qatar and another $200 million from the United Arab Emirates and then the $625 million from foreign investors that we don’t even know who they are. So what was Jared Kushner doing in the White House? And, by the way as a fun fact, on January 6, the famous January 6, Jared Kushner was in the Middle East.”
A notable highlight from Rattner’s observations was Kushner’s lack of experience in the realm of hedge funds, having exclusively operated within the real estate sector—with a track record that wasn’t particularly impressive—before entering the White House.
Elise Jordan, one of the panelists, interjected with her observation that information about Kushner’s funding execution was notably scarce. Despite his considerable financial resources, Kushner’s background in private equity was lacking, and scant reports indicated a minor European investment. She speculated on the possibility that Saudi Arabia’s investment might serve a political contingency plan in the event of Trump’s return to office.
“There is not much out there on how he is executing his funding. He has all this money, but his background is not in private equity and I’ve seen only one news report of a small European investment,” she said. “Are the Saudis investing with him just to hedge their bets politically in case Trump comes back into office?”
Watch the segment below from MSNBC.
"I've been in this business 40 years. I've never seen something like this."
Steve Rattner breaks down all the unusual, shady aspects of Jared Kushner's pay-to-play scheme that pulled in billions in Saudi money.#TrumpCrimeFamily pic.twitter.com/ieSXH3Mn8X
— Democratic Coalition (@TheDemCoalition) August 14, 2023
Jared Kushner spent much of his White House tenure cozying up to MBS & Saudi Arabia.
Six months after leaving Washington, his private equity firm landed $2 billion in investments from the Saudi sovereign wealth fund. @Morning_Joe pic.twitter.com/NSeCFBuyXV
— Steven Rattner (@SteveRattner) August 14, 2023
