Rep. James Comer (R-KY) relied on the classic political cop out on a Sunday interview when asked if House Republicans will look into former President Donald Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s financial entanglements with the Saudis.
“I think everything’s on the table,” Comer blurted out when ABC News host George Stephanopoulos asked if the GOP-led House Oversight Committee will investigate Kushner’s ties to the Saudis.
But Comer, who’s the chair of the Oversight Committee, then quickly pivoted away from answering that question and started talking about his committee’s overwhelming priority: Hunter Biden.
“Look, we’re investigating Joe Biden. We — we know that Joe Biden said during the presidential campaign that he had no knowledge of his son’s business interests. He wasn’t involved. He didn’t benefit from them. We have evidence that would suggest otherwise. And this is very concerning,” Comer said.
The question comes amid mounting evidence of a cozy relationship between the Trump family and the Saudis, extending from the former president’s time in office to lucrative deals post-presidency. The Washington Post published a revealing article detailing new revelations about Kushner’s business ties to the Saudis and the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Just a day after leaving the White House, Kushner created a company that months later became a private equity firm with $2 billion investment from a sovereign wealth fund led by the Saudi Crown Prince himself, the New York Times reported last year.
Kushner’s firm structured the funds it received in a way that let his company avoid disclosing the source of it, according to SEC paperwork the Washington Post analyzed for its Saturday report. It’s a common strategy that allows many firms to avoid transparency about where their funding comes from, the Post reported.
A former administration official allied with Kushner told the Post that there are quite a few examples of top former government employees conducting business with people they worked with while in public service.
But a significant question lingers over this particular firm: How did Trump and Kushner use their positions in the White House to develop their relationship with the Saudi crown prince in order to bolster their post-presidency business dealings.
“I think it was an obvious opportunity for them to build their Rolodexes,” former Trump national security advisor John Bolton told the Washington Post. “And I think they were probably hard at work at it, particularly Jared.”
“Why should Jared be worried about the Middle East?” Bolton added. “It’s a perfectly logical inference was that had something to do with business.”
Kushner is not the only Trump family member who has seen a windfall from the Saudis in recent months. After leaving the White House, Trump’s golf courses began hosting tournaments for LIV Golf, a professional golf tour financed by the Saudis.
And separately, last year, the Trump Organization secured an agreement with a Saudi real estate company that plans to build a Trump hotel in Oman as part of a $4 billion golf resort.
