Privileged Access for Private Gain, Otherwise Known as Presidential Corruption

 

Umar Kremlev, a businessman with ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, paid for a fireworks display and rented a private island for Donald Trump Jr. and Bettina Anderson’s wedding this year.

Mireya Acierto via Getty Images

 

"A toaster is a wedding gift. A private-island party paid for by a Putin-connected oligarch is something else."

"Republicans nearly wore out the subpoena machine investigating Hunter Biden's foreign relationships. We should not unplug it now."

"The country should not have to accept one standard for the family of a Republican president and another for the family of a Democratic president."

"It's corruption. I don't like it." 

Utah Senator John Curtis 

Hasn't this always been done? Perhaps a little more discreetly, not to bring it to public notice. Remember former President Bill Clinton and his Clinton Foundation being found out when he had taken donations to his charity from questionable sources that it was intimated wanted to have access to his wife in her influential post in the Obama administration as Secretary of State? Were Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Oman and Algeria passing out millions just out of the goodness of their hearts, and not for access and influence? 

 

The Trump family, despite their own wealth, are impressed with the palatial digs of Middle Eastern nobility. And if one such country decides to gift Donald J. Trump with a token of his admiration and appreciation through presenting him with a sumptuously-outfitted mega-jet, it's unlikely the gift was anything but a token that could lead the way to preferential treatment. Or not. Say, the casual ability to overlook the fact that Qatar is a leading sponsor of jihad-addicted terrorist groups. 

 

 The discovery that a Russian oligarch, a personal friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin, had made friendly overtures to the son of the President of the United States, to secure an amicable relationship well-oiled by a generous, costly gift is interesting for what it can reveal of a semblance of warm feelings between Mr. Trump the president and Mr. Putin the president. The Trump family is widely recognized for having ethics-questionable business interests. And that the U.S. president  uses his office to enrich himself and his family is not really classified information. 

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks with Umar Kremlev during an event in Moscow in September 2022. (Gavriil Grigorov/Pool/Sputnik/Reuters)

 

The situation, revealed by the news outlet PropPublica, that Donald Trump Jr. had a friendly relationship with a wealthy Russian that resulted in an opulent gift from that Russian to the American president's son, grates on the principles and sense of ethical responsibility that should sit with the White House, as far as Utah Senator John Curtis is concerned. The Republican senator wants Donald Trump Jr. to be subpoenaed over the bankrolling by Umar Kremlev of a lavish wedding ceremony enjoyed by the president's son and daughter-in-law and their guests.

 

He has approached the Senate Judiciary Committee for an investigation into the issue of presidential families using their political connections for their own financial interests. Umar Kremlev may be spoken of fondly as a good friend, by the two younger Trumps, Donald Jr. and his wife Bettina, but theirs is an acquaintanceship not long in the tooth. When U.S. President Trump reacted initially to the Russian Invasion of Ukraine by sanctioning a number of Russians close to Putin, including some oligarchs, Mr. Kremley feared he would be among them. Befriending the Trumps would obviously make that less likely.

 

Senator Curtis's request, based on the ProPublica investigation that reported hundreds of thousands were paid by Umar Kremlev toward the three-day wedding celebrations in the Bahamas -- including rental of a private island and a fireworks display that took place in May -- further distances some members of the 
Republican party from the president. That two nights of celebration was "very generously hosted" by their Russian friend was not denied by Trump Jr. and his wife.

 

Donald Trump Jr.'s secret wedding benefactor    Pro Publica

 

In a spirit of all-inclusive rancor, Senator Curtis included Hunter Biden to also be subpoenaed, that Congress should rightfully apply the same standards to families of presidents, irrespective of which party they represented. Trump Jr.'s cryptocurrency ventures, international real estate dealings, defence investments and ties to prediction markets were all to be investigated, according to the letter addressed to Republican judiciary committee chair Chuck Grassley, and Dick Durbin, the committee's top Democrat. 

 

The committee was asked to study closely whether ethics and anti-corruption laws currently existing are adequate for the prevention of the presidency becoming "a vehicle for private enrichment by those closest to it". The wedding revelations, he stated unequivocally, represented an issue that "just stinks".  

 

Kremlev hosted Trump Jr. at an event in Istanbul in September 2025. International Boxing Association

 

 

The Sanctity of the Independent Judiciary

"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start."

"The inescapable conclusion is that a right to an abortion is not deeply rooted in the nation's history and traditions."

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito

"If this decision holds, it's really quite a radical decision. I hope there are not enough votes for it [in the Supreme Court]." 

"I believe that a woman's right to choose is fundamental. Roe has been the law of the land for almost fifty years, and basic fairness and the stability of our law demand that it not be overturned."

U.S. President Joe Biden 

"[The leaked document was] authentic [while not representing the] final position [of the court. The leak represented a] singular and egregious breach [of trust that will be investigated]."

"To the extent this betrayal of the confidences of the court was intended to undermine the integrity of our operations, it will not succeed. The work of the court will not be affected in any way."

U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts

May 3rd 2022 Demonstration outside the Supreme Court  Photo: AP

It is truly the most societally polarizing of issues; nothing separates people as dramatically as disagreement on the basic issue of ending a pregnancy. There were once socially accepted solutions that pleased the conservative-minded and which were supported by a kind of social fiat; women had to carry pregnancies through to completion, give birth and surrender their babies for adoption. 

This was a patriarchal society's solution for the disposition of an unwanted child, a reflection of religion's part to play in its dictation that women are meant to bear children and must on no account seek to end a pregnancy before its full term and the birth of a child. The very fact that women were held to a male-dominated discipline that punished them for their biological gift of child bearing was taken for granted. Women may have chafed against the social ownership of their bodies and the biological function they were endowed with, but acceptance was general for they had no other options.

\Those who made attempts to destroy their pregnancies through forbidden means of interference with nature's blueprint would be punished if discovered, and many others paid the ultimate price of their defiance of religious and social ritual expectations of female subordination to church and hearth. And then came the social phenomena of Women's Liberation that roiled North America, and eventually the rest of the world.

When women stood up and demanded to be recognized as having authority over the disposition of their own bodies, not society at large. When demands that abortion rights be respected; that women's human rights entitled them to decide when and if they would carry a pregnancy, not society or circumstances. It was an epic struggle, the church damning the impertinence of women and governments loathe to surrender their authority by acquiescence.

Gradually, the issue was recognized as a right owed women and abortion rights was accepted, but for a minority of men and women who abhor the very idea of legalized abortion, convinced it was little different than state-authorized murder. Which made a compelling argument for the procedure to take place in the first semester before the foetus became or came close to viability; to survive outside the womb.

"It would mean every other decision relating to the notion of privacy is thrown into question. It goes far beyond the concerns of whether or not there is the right to choose." 

"It goes to other basic rights, all the decisions related to  your private life, who you marry, whether or not you decide to conceive a child. It's a fundamental shift in American jurisprudence."

"I'm not willing to leave that to the whims of local areas. It will fall on voters to elect pro-choice officials this November."

U.S. President Joe Birden

The division between those supporting a woman's right to choose whether she would carry a pregnancy to term, or decide to end the pregnancy prematurely has been fairly well accepted by society at large. At the same time the issue simmers beneath the surface of civil society, with ample numbers of groups dedicated to outlawing abortion and mandating once again the criminalization of abortion. Yet most recently 69 percent of Americans feel that abortion rights should not be overturned, opposed to 29 percent claiming the need to do so.

In the United States, the division between social Democrats and Republications has become strained with the emergence of partisanship over social mores widening dramatically in the past decade. Nowhere is that strain more evident than in the issue of legal abortion being overturned. The divisions so stark that the executive branch of government, now held by Democrats, sees fit to challenge the independence of the nation's Supreme Court, to which a previous administration had appointed hard-right candidates, forming a majority.

In a true liberal-democracy the state judiciary stands above politics, theoretically. And the executive branch does not interfere much less question the legal authority of the judicial branch. In the same token, justices are held to the concept of neutrality on issues they deal with, for it is justice that must prevail, not the conviction of personal emotions/opinions. Here also, the Supreme Court justices in the majority seek to rule on overturning a social issue supported by the majority of the people.

Demonstrators protest outside of the U.S. Supreme Court, Tuesday, May 3, 2022, in Washington, D.C. Jacquelyn Martin/AP

"Is a brave clerk [at the Supreme Court] taking this unprecedented step of leaking a draft opinion to warn the country whats coming, in a last ditch Hail Mary attempt to see if the public response might cause the court to reconsider?'

Brian Fallon, press secretary to Hillary Clinton in 2016

 

"As a former Supreme Court clerk, I can tell you there are very few people in the entire building who had access to the opinion."

Mike Lee, Republican Senator