You’ll never believe it, but the Trump and Kushner companies have secured millions in PPP loans

Almost four years later Donald trump moved into the White House, there are a number of things that we expect from the administration, of which incompetence, chaos and self-operation are actually quite predictable. The president can be expected to spend a significant portion of his day tweeting incomprehensible attacks on people deemed disloyal. We can expect that Stephen miller will be actively hatch unique ways to make immigrant life hell. And we can expect that, if the opportunity arises, Trump and his children will do everything in their power to profit from the presidency, no matter how transparent and corrupt it is.

So really, it was only a matter of time before we learned that businesses owned by Trump and his son-in-law’s family were receiving millions of dollars in pandemic relief loans. Or that despite the fact that the money was largely intended to prevent employees from being fired, only a handful of employees at companies owned by Trump and Kushner were kept on the payroll. Through NBC News:

Scanning [analysis of] data released by the Small Business Administration … revealed that properties owned by the Trump organization as well as the Kushner companies, owned by the family of Jared kushner, son-in-law and senior adviser to President Donald Trump, took advantage of the program.

More than 25 PPP loans worth more than $ 3.65 million have been made to companies with addresses in Trump and Kushner real estate properties, paying rent to those owners. Fifteen of the properties said they kept only one job, no jobs, or reported no numbers.

Trump, of course, chose not to quit his business on becoming president, and continues to profit from it – profits that have been well boosted by his insistence on accommodation foreign rulers in its properties, defraud the secret service, and impose on taxpayers for the water he drinks in Mar-a-Lago, among others. Kushner, with Ivanka, made at least $ 36 million last year, largely thanks to his stake in his family’s real estate company. (In 2017, the duo reported income of at least $ 82 million, so times are obviously tough.)

In addition to revealing loans to Trump and Kushner companies, PPP data showed ridiculous mismanagement of the program, with over 100 loans going to unnamed companies listed and other companies appearing to play with the system for loans ranging up to $ 10 million through their affiliates.

The original stated intention of the PPP programs by officials was to help payroll for small businesses struggling with the effects of coronavirus lockdowns…. But almost from the start, the programs, especially PPP, drew criticism for the way they were administered and delivered, and for their fairness. Large national banks initially only granted loans to customers with whom they had pre-existing lending relationships. Businesses owned by people of color without strong banking relationships found themselves with limited access and forced them to find other avenues of funding.

There was also the lingering question of what defined a ‘small business’, after lobbying from the hotel and restaurant industry inflated the maximum number of employees allowed to 500, even though more than 98% of small businesses in America have less than 100 employees.