Trump owes tens of millions to the Bank of China — and the loan is due soon - POLITICO

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Trump owes tens of millions to the Bank of China — and the loan is due soon

The president's financial dealings with the state-owned bank complicate his attacks on Biden.

President Donald Trump. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images

By MARC CAPUTO, MERIDITH MCGRAW and ANITA KUMAR

04/24/2020 04:30 AM EDT

Updated: 04/24/2020 08:43 AM EDT

Donald Trump is warning "China will own the United States" if Joe Biden is elected president.

But Trump himself is tens of millions of dollars in debt to China: In 2012, his real estate partner refinanced one of Trump's most prized New York buildings for almost $1 billion. The debt includes $211 million from the state-owned Bank of China — its first loan of this kind in the U.S. — which matures in the middle of what could be Trump's second term, financial records show.

Steps from Trump Tower in Manhattan, the 43-story 1290 Avenue of the Americas skyscraper spans an entire city block. Trump owns a 30 percent stake in the property valued at more than $1 billion , making it one of the priciest addresses in his portfolio, according to his financial disclosures.

Trump's ownership of the building received a smattering of attention before and after his 2016 campaign. But the arrangement with the Bank of China — and its impending due date in 2022 — has gone largely unnoticed.

The revelation complicates one of Trump's emerging campaign attacks against Biden: that the former vice president would be a gift to the Communist country and America's chief economic rival.

Aside from the historic precedent of a developer-turned president paying back millions to a bank controlled by a foreign government, the 2012 Bank of China deal also stands out because Trump and his campaign have repeatedly highlighted the same bank's role in a $1.5 billion deal announced in 2013 by partners of Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden. Critics of the Bidens have seized on the fact that the agreement materialized just days after Hunter Biden traveled to China with the then-vice president, who was there on official business.

"Why did the Chinese government's bank want to do business with Hunter Biden while his dad was Vice President," Trump's campaign asked on Twitter earlier this month. The issue was also raised in a campaign ad the day before, one in a stream of criticisms about the China deal raised by campaign spokespeople and Trump since last year.

The Trump campaign has steadily increased its focus on trying to portray Biden as weak on China amid rising voter disapproval of China, the source of the coronavirus pandemic. Trump surrogate Corey Lewandowski dubbed him "Beijing Biden" in an online campaign event Wednesday. And during a White House news briefing Saturday, Trump said China will "own" the U.S. if Biden wins.

But Trump's recent criticisms of China have been muddied by his own mixed messaging as well as by his numerous financial ties to the country. Those connections extend far beyond the Avenue of the America's loan: Chinese state-owned companies are constructing two luxury Trump developments in United Arab Emirates and Indonesia. The president and his daughter Ivanka Trump, a White House adviser, have been awarded trademarks by China's government. And his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has courted Chinese investors in at least one other real estate deal.

"We actually explored all these foreign enterprises and how once he became president he'd be seen differently by foreign leaders who would have leverage over this president because he had investments in their countries and/or financial dealings with business enterprises and financial institutions and investors in their countries," said Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), a member of the House Oversight Committee. "He is highly conflicted with respect to China."

Trump has denied he has any conflicts. But he rejected calls to fully separate from his namesake company, which comprises more than 500 businesses and includes properties in nearly two dozen countries, after he was sworn into office. He still owns his business, though he asked his adult sons to run it. His holdings were placed in a trust designed to hold assets for his benefit from which he can draw money at any time without public knowledge.

The building at 1290 Avenue of the Americas is a particular point of pride for Trump, who mentioned it when he announced his candidacy in 2015.

"I beat China all the time," Trump said during a speech at the time from Trump Tower, adding, "I own a big chunk of the Bank of America building [in San Francisco] and 1290 Avenue of the Americas that I got from China in a war. Very valuable. I love China."

A New York Times article in 2016, however, reported that Trump had to settle for 30 percent ownership of both buildings. Trump continues to own that share of both properties, which are touted under the real estate portfolio section of the Trump Organization's website.

Trump is considered a passive investor who doesn't control the financing or management of 1290 Avenue of the Americas. The main investor is Vornado Realty Trust, which owns 70 percent.

The debt stems from a $950 million refinancing deal in 2012, to which the Bank of China chipped in $211 million. With the loan, Bank of China became the first in the nation to enter the U.S. securitization market, according to a 2013 Wall Street Journal article. Vornado's federal financial disclosures show it and the other owner of 1290 Avenue of the Americas — Trump — are still indebted from the 2012 deal.

"While Trump is talking about the former vice president's son's financial dealings, in Trump's case, it is the president himself who has a company he still owns and profits from that has financial relationships with the countries that he is supposed to be negotiating with on behalf of the American people," said Robert Maguire, research director for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

"There are definitely legitimate questions that are raised by Hunter Biden's actions," Maguire said. "They are not even in the same ballpark as the conflict of interest questions raised by President Trump's continued relationship with his own company."