Susan Walsh/AP
- The Saudi royal family gave Jared Kushner nearly $48,000 worth of gifts, the NYT reports.
- Kushner ended up paying for the value of the gifts, which included two swords and a dagger.
- The Times uncovered the previously undisclosed presents for an investigation published Monday.
The Saudi royal family gave Jared Kushner nearly $48,000 worth of gifts including two swords and a dagger, The New York Times reported Monday.
Kushner ended up paying the US government the full $47,920 value that the gifts were worth after he left the White House, The Times said. The value of the items far exceeds the maximum of $415 worth of gifts that US officials are allowed to accept and keep from foreign entities and governments under the Foreign Gifts and Decorations Act.
The swords and dagger were among over 80 presents and tokens the Saudis lavished on Trump and his delegation upon their first visit to the country in 2017, which The Times uncovered as part of a broader investigation into the Trump administration's practices of accepting and disclosing gifts from foreign governments.
The Times also found that the gifts from the Saudi royals included robes which appeared to made from real white tiger and cheetah fur, sparking a warning from the White House counsel's office that keeping them could violate the Endangered Species Act.
The existence of the robes, which the White House didn't disclose until Trump's last day in office, were eventually taken in for inspection by the US Fish and Wildlife Service in summer of 2021, and found to be dyed to look like real cheetah and tiger fur, the Interior Department confirmed to The Times.
Men in Saudi Arabia and Yemen have traditionally worn daggers at their waist. Known as jambiya, the daggers carried in belts typically have a curved blade and a decorated hilt, and are often passed down to young men by older male relatives.
Kushner, former President Donald Trump's son-in-law and a senior White House advisor, took the lead on shaping and executing the White House's Middle East policy with a particular focus on Israel-Palestine relations.
The Trump administration took a decidedly more friendly approach towards Saudi Arabia than its predecessors under former President Barack Obama. Saudi officials devoted significant resources to courting Kushner, given his focus on the Middle East, as an ally to promote their strategic interests and get the White House on their side in disputes in the region.
Kushner himself developed a close relationship with the powerful and ambitious Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, also known as MBS. Kushner got on a first name basis with the Prince Mohammed, with the two frequently messaging and calling eachother on WhatsApp in direct interactions that concerned US national security officials, The Times reported in 2018.
In one fall 2017 trip that Kushner took to Saudi Arabia, the Washington Post's David Ignatius wrote that "the two princes are said to have stayed up until nearly 4 a.m. several nights, swapping stories and planning strategy." The Intercept subsequently reported that Prince Mohammed bragged to the Crown Prince of the United Arab Emirates that he had Kushner "in his pocket."
Kushner maintained the relationship and was one of Crown Prince's most powerful defenders after US intelligence concluded he directly ordered the 2018 assassination of exiled Saudi journalist and Washington Post writer Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey. In a 2020 interview with Newsweek, Kushner said the Prince had made "a couple of missteps" but was still a "very good ally."