Trump Will Bring Major Conflicts of Interest Into His China Summit

When the president meets with China’s leader at Mar-A-Lago, he’ll be carrying a lot of baggage.

Ron Sachs/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


When Donald Trump meets with Chinese president Xi Jinping at Mar-a-Lago today, he’ll go into the talks with no particular expertise on US-China diplomatic relations or experience as an international negotiator. But, like with many other areas of his presidency, Trump will bring his own personal business history and the conflicts of interest it entails.

Trump has often portrayed China as a bogeyman when it comes to economic issues, but he’s also repeatedly sought to establish business ties there. A major Chinese state-run financial institution, for example, is a key tenant in Trump Tower.

As recently as February, weeks after taking his oath of office, Trump sold a $15.8 million penthouse condo in his Trump Park Avenue building to a Chinese-American businesswoman named Angela Chen, who has extensive ties to China’s ruling elite. Prior to taking office, Trump said he was separating himself from the daily operations of his businesses, but because he refused to divest his ownership, the sale still personally benefited the president. On a website for a business she runs, Chen, who paid cash for the condo, describes herself as a consultant who can help provide international investors with access to the most powerful people in China. As Mother Jones also reported, Chen runs the American branch of a Chinese nonprofit established by Deng Rong—the daughter of Deng Xiaoping, who led China in the tumultous years after Mao Zedong’s death. On the website of Chen’s nonprofit, the group appeared to link itself to another Chinese organization called the Chinese Association For International Friendly Contact—an organization considered by China experts to be a front for Chinese military intelligence.

That deal followed news that Trump had won a long-running case to secure control over a number of trademarks in his name in China. Trump, who already has more than 70 trademarks in China and almost 50 more requests pending, won the trademarks after spending a decade unsuccessfully making the case he deserved them. Not all of the trademarks that Trump won control over are necessarily ones he’ll want to use himself—for example, a trademark for an escort service—but, instead, are “defensive trademarks” intended to protect his brand from being misused in China.

And those are just Trump’s dealings in China since being sworn in on January 20. Here are the highlights—and lowlights—of Trump’s business record with China, America’s biggest trading partner.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate