- Prosecutors in Maryland last year subpoenaed financial documents from DJT Holdings LLC, a company that owns President Donald Trump’s golf courses in Scotland, The Times of London reported on Monday.
- It’s part of an investigation into whether Trump is still profiting from his companies. That would violate the US Constitution’s emoluments clause, which bars public officials from receiving gifts or cash without congressional approval.
- Glenn Simpson, the cofounder of Fusion GPS, the opposition-research firm behind the dossier alleging that Russia has a hold on Trump, has suggested a link between the courses and Russia.
- He told the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 that the president’s UK resorts were “concerning” and that there were “enormous amounts of capital flowing into these projects from unknown sources.”
- Read the full subpoena below.
US prosecutors last year ordered the company that owns President Donald Trump’s golf courses in Scotland to show its financial filings in an attempt to reveal its ownership, The Times of London reported on Monday.
Prosecutors in Maryland in December subpoenaed documents related to properties controlled by DJT Holdings LLC, a company that owns Trump’s hotel in Washington, DC, and resorts in places like Turnberry, Scotland, according to Trump’s financial disclosure form. You can read the full filing at the bottom of this article.
The documents are part of an investigation into whether Trump still profits from his businesses. It focuses on Trump International Washington, an old post office building in the US capital that Trump converted into a luxury hotel in 2016.
Trump has attempted to have this case dismissed multiple times.
Brian Frosh, the Maryland attorney general, said he was "seeking information proving that hotel revenues were flowing to the president through his affiliated entities," according to The Times.
Frosh added: "We are confident that at the end of discovery we will be able to prove our case that President Trump is violating the Constitution's emoluments clauses, America's first anti-corruption laws."
The US Constitution's emoluments clause prohibits public officials from receiving gifts or cash from foreign or state governments without congressional approval.
It is not clear how DJT Holdings is funded.
People investigating Trump's ties to Russia, including Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, and Glenn Simpson, the cofounder of the opposition-research firm Fusion GPS, have questioned whether Moscow was financially involved in DJT Holdings.
Fusion GPS is best known for hiring the former MI6 officer Christopher Steele to produce the dossier most infamously alleging that Trump hired prostitutes to "perform a 'golden showers' (urination) show in front of him" during a visit to the Moscow Ritz-Carlton in 2013.
Simpson told the House Intelligence Committee in November 2017 that Trump's golf courses in Scotland and Ireland were "concerning" because their financial statements show "enormous amounts of capital flowing into these projects from unknown sources."
Simpson said the golf courses "don't, on their face, show Russian involvement, but what they do show is enormous amounts of capital flowing into these projects from unknown sources and - or at least on paper it says it's from the Trump Organization, but it's hundreds of millions of dollars."
"These golf courses are just, you know, they're sinks," he added. "They don't actually make any money."
The Trump Organization and Trump Turnberry did not immediately respond to INSIDER's request for comment on the subpoena and Simpson's comments.
Read more: Fusion GPS interview with House panel leaves huge pile of breadcrumbs for Trump-Russia investigators
Citing two people familiar with the matter, The New York Times reported over the weekend that the Trump Organization asked Deutsche Bank for a loan to pay for work on a golf resort in Turnberry during the 2016 campaign.
But the German lender refused, worrying that public knowledge of a new financial deal with Trump would hurt its reputation, the report said.
The Times said the Trump Organization denied requesting any loans for "the purchase or the refurbishment of Trump Turnberry" but did not explicitly address whether it asked Deutsche Bank for money.
Read the full subpoena:
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