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Jared Kushner - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Kushner
Jared
Corey Kushner (born January 10, 1981) is an American real estate
investor and developer, newspaper owner, and senior advisor to President
Donald ...
Jared Kushner
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Jared Kushner | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Assistant to the President and Senior Advisor | |
| Assumed office January 20, 2017 |
|
| President | Donald Trump |
| Preceded by | |
| Director of the Office of American Innovation | |
| Assumed office March 27, 2017 |
|
| President | Donald Trump |
| Preceded by | Office established |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Jared Corey Kushner January 10, 1981 Livingston, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Political party | Democratic[1] |
| Spouse(s) | Ivanka Trump (m. 2009) |
| Children | 3 |
| Relatives | Charles Kushner (father) Joshua Kushner (brother) Murray Kushner (uncle) |
| Education | Harvard University (AB) New York University (JD, MBA) |
| Religion | Judaism |
Kushner is the elder son of real-estate developer Charles Kushner and is married to Trump's daughter Ivanka. He was principal owner of the real-estate holding and development company Kushner Companies and of Observer Media, publisher of the New York Observer. He is the co-founder and part owner of Cadre, an online real-estate investment platform.[2][3]
On January 9, 2017, Kushner was named as a senior White House advisor. He consequently resigned as CEO of Kushner Companies and as publisher of the Observer,[4] but his private financial interests remain a subject of controversy.[5] Kushner helped develop and run Trump's digital media strategy.
Contents
Family history, early life and education
Kushner was born in Livingston, New Jersey,[6] to Seryl Kushner (née Stadtmauer) and Charles Kushner, a real-estate developer.[7] His paternal grandparents, Rae and Joseph Kushner, were Holocaust survivors who came to the U.S. in 1949 from Navahrudak, Belarus (then USSR).[8][9]Kushner has a younger brother, Joshua, and two sisters, Nicole and Dara. He is a nephew of Murray Kushner, the owner of Kushner Real Estate Group.
Kushner was raised in a Modern Orthodox Jewish family.[10] He graduated from the Frisch School, a coed yeshiva high school, in 1999. According to a spokeswoman for Kushner Companies, he was an honors student and a member of the debate, hockey, and basketball teams.[11] Former school officials described him as a less than stellar student.[12] In 1998 Charles pledged $2.5 million to Harvard University.[13]
Kushner matriculated at Harvard College in 1999. He lived in Kirkland House, was elected into the Fly Club, and bought and sold real estate in Somerville, Massachusetts, as a vice president of Somerville Building Associates (a division of Kushner Companies). His uncle, Kushner Companies partner Richard Stadtmauer, was also a vice president; the venture was dissolved in 2005 after returning a profit of $20 million.[14][15] Kushner graduated from Harvard in 2003 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in government.[13][16]
In 2004 Charles Kushner was arrested on charges of tax evasion, illegal campaign donations, and witness tampering. He was prosecuted by then U.S. Attorney Chris Christie,[17] convicted, and sentenced to two years in prison.[18] In 2006 Stadtmauer was indicted on lesser counts, also by Christie; he received a three-year sentence.[19][20]
In 2007, Kushner graduated from New York University, where he earned a JD and an MBA. He interned at Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau's office and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP.[21]
Kushner married Ivanka Trump, daughter of businessman and U.S. president Donald Trump, in a Jewish ceremony on October 25, 2009.[22][23] They are Modern Orthodox Jews, keep a kosher home, and observe the Jewish Sabbath.[24][25][26] Jared and Ivanka have three children, a girl and two boys.[27] In 2017 federal disclosures suggested Kushner and his wife had assets worth at least $740 million.[28][29][not in citation given]
Business career
Real estate
Kushner is a real estate investor, and has increased the Kushner Companies' presence in the New York City real estate market as a principal in his family's real estate company.[30]
Kushner Companies purchased 666 Fifth Avenue in 2007 for $1.8 billion, the most expensive single property purchase in US history at the time.[31]
On August 18, 2014, Kushner acquired a three-building apartment portfolio in Middle River, Maryland, for $37.9 million with Aion Partners. In 2013–14, he and his company acquired more than 11,000 units throughout New York, New Jersey, and the Baltimore area.[35] In May 2015, he purchased 50.1% of the Times Square Building from Africa Israel Investments Ltd. for $295 million.[36]
In May 2015, Kushner purchased a majority stake of One Times Square for $295 million.[36]
In 2015, Kushner scored spot No. 25 on Fortune's "40 Under 40" list ranking the most influential young people in business.[39]
Newspaper publishing
Kushner and Peter W. Kaplan in September 2008
After purchasing the Observer, Kushner published it in tabloid format.[42] Since then, he has been credited with increasing the Observer's online presence and expanding the Observer Media Group.[43][44] With no substantial experience in journalism, Kushner could not establish a good relationship with the newspaper's veteran editor-in-chief, Peter W. Kaplan.[45] "This guy doesn't know what he doesn't know," Kaplan remarked about Kushner, to colleagues, at the time.[45] As a result of his differences with Kushner, Kaplan quit his position. Kaplan was followed by a series of short-lived successors until Kushner hired Elizabeth Spiers in 2011.[46] It has been alleged that Kushner used Observer as propaganda against rivals in real estate.[46][47] In December 2011, the New York Post reported that the Observer expected to become profitable for the first time.[48] Spiers left the newspaper in 2012. In January 2013, Kushner hired a new editor-in-chief, Ken Kurson. Kurson had been a consultant to Republican political candidates in New Jersey[46] and one-time member of Rudy Giuliani's unsuccessful 2008 presidential primary campaign.
According to Vanity Fair, under Kushner, the "Observer has lost virtually all of its cultural currency among New York's elite, but the paper is now profitable and reporting traffic growth ... [it] boasts 6 million unique visitors per month, up from 1.3 million in January 2013".[49] In April 2016, the New York Observer became one of only a handful of newspapers to officially endorse United States presidential candidate Donald Trump in the Republican primary, but the paper ended the campaign period by choosing not to back any presidential candidate at all.[50][51]
Kushner stepped down from his newspaper role in January 2017 to pursue a role in President Donald Trump's administration. He was replaced by his brother-in-law, Joseph Meyer.[52]
Los Angeles Dodgers bid
In February 2012, Kushner put in a bid to acquire the MLB team the Los Angeles Dodgers,[53] but withdrew it the next month.[54]Political activity
Earlier career and family history
Jared Kushner had been a lifelong Democrat and had made major donations to its candidates for years before reportedly undergoing an "ideological conversion" and supporting the 2015–16 Trump campaign.[59] Kushner has had no prior involvement in campaign politics or in government before his father-in-law, Trump's, campaign.[60]In April 2017, Politico Magazine published an article purporting to show long-term links between Kushner, Russian Jewish oligarchs, Donald Trump, Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Jewish outreach organization Chabad-Lubavitch.[61] The article was widely condemned, with the head of the Anti-Defamation League Jonathan Greenblatt saying that it "evokes age-old myths about Jews".[62][63][64]
Presidential campaign
Kushner and the Trump family, pictured at a campaign victory party in Des Moines, Iowa on February 1, 2016
According to Eric Schmidt[the cited source questions part of the quoted statement], "Jared Kushner is the biggest surprise of the 2016 election, stating, "Best I can tell, he actually ran the campaign and did it with essentially no resources."[70] Federal Election Commission filings indicate the Trump campaign spent $343 million, about 59 percent as much as the Clinton campaign.[71]
On July 5, 2016, Kushner wrote an open letter in the New York Observer addressing the controversy around a tweet from the Trump campaign containing allegedly antisemitic imagery. He was responding to his own paper's editorial by Dana Schwartz criticizing Kushner's involvement with the Trump campaign.[72] In the letter, Kushner wrote, "In my opinion, accusations like 'racist' and 'anti-Semite' are being thrown around with a carelessness that risks rendering these words meaningless."[73]
Presidential transition
Japanese PM Shinzō Abe meets with Ivanka, president-elect Donald Trump and Jared Kushner
Kushner was reportedly an influential factor behind the firing of New Jersey governor Chris Christie as head of the transition team, as well as the dismissal from the Donald Trump transition team of anyone connected to Christie.[77][78] An anonymous source familiar with the transition told Politico, "Jared doesn't like Christie... He's always held [the prosecution of his father] against Christie."[79] Kushner told Forbes that the reports that he was involved in Christie's dismissal were false: "Six months ago, Governor Christie and I decided this election was much bigger than any differences we may have had in the past, and we worked very well together... I was not behind pushing out him or his people."[80]
Senior Advisor to the President
President Trump, Marco Rubio and Kushner visit a fourth grade classroom in Orlando, Florida
Trump put Kushner in charge of brokering peace in Israeli–Palestinian conflict as well as making deals with foreign countries, although in what way he is in charge is unclear.[87][88][89] Furthermore, after Donald Trump became President-elect, Kushner and his wife met with Japanese Prime Minister and other Japanese officials while his wife was conducting a licensing deal between her namesake clothing brand and a Japanese government-owned company.[90] His wife sat in on a meeting between her father, then President-elect Donald Trump and Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.[91] In February 2017, his wife Ivanka Trump was a surprise attendee at the Chinese Embassy's New Year's party.[92] In late March 2017, he was also given the new role of leading the "White House Office of American Innovation".[93][94]
Kushner during the April 2017 Syrian missile strike operation
Kushner and President Donald Trump in Jerusalem, May 2017
Unidentified sources claim Kushner was an advocate of the dismissal of FBI Director James Comey in May 2017.[96]
According to The New York Times, Kushner was involved in the sale of $100+ billion of arms to Saudi Arabia, and during a meeting with Saudi officials on May 1, 2017, at the White House, Kushner called Lockheed Martin CEO Marillyn Hewson to ask for a lower price on an radar system to detect ballistic missiles.[97]
Kushner's business activities in China have drawn scrutiny for mixing government with business.[98][99] Kushner's investments in real estate and financial services have also drawn controversy for conflicts of interest.[28][100] In May, the Wall Street Journal reported that he had failed to disclose all required financial information in his security clearance applications, including that he owes $1 billion in loans.[3][101]
Russian investigation
Kushner's contacts with Russian officials have come under scrutiny as part of the larger federal investigation into Russian interference in the election.[102]In April 2017, it was revealed that Kushner failed to disclose on his top-secret security clearance application form that he had met with Russian officials, including Sergei Gorkov, chairman of a Russian government-owned bank, Vnesheconombank (VEB), and the Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, in December 2016.[103] White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer stated that Kushner met with Gorkov briefly as part of his role in the transition and as a diplomatic conduit to the State Department.[104] However, VEB issued a statement that said Gorkov met with Kushner on a private matter concerning his family's real estate corporation, Kushner Companies, even though VEB has been under international sanctions since July 2014.[105] Kushner's lawyer has called the omission from his security clearance form an "oversight." Democratic lawmakers, including some members of the House of Representatives, have called for suspension or revoking of Kushner's security clearance, and have written request letters to the then Director of the FBI James Comey and Charles Phalen, director of the National Background Investigations Bureau.[106]
On May 25, 2017, several news outlets reported that Kushner was under investigation by the FBI as part of the larger investigation into Russian interference in the election. According to The Washington Post, Kushner is being investigated "because of the extent and nature of his interactions with the Russians", meetings he failed to report on his security clearance application form. Kushner's lawyer stated that Kushner had volunteered to face a Congressional inquiry into the matter.[107][108] According to ABC News, Kushner himself is not a target of investigation but his meetings with Gorkov and Kislyak are being scrutinized by the FBI.[109]
On May 26, 2017, The Washington Post reported that U.S. intelligence officials had, in the course of monitoring Ambassador Kislyak in December 2016, overheard him relaying to Moscow a request from Kushner to establish a "secret and secure communications channel" with the Kremlin using Russian diplomatic facilities. According to the report, "Kislyak reportedly was taken aback by the suggestion ... that would have carried security risks for Moscow as well as the Trump team." The Washington Post noted that Russian officials occasionally leak "false information into communication streams it suspects are monitored as a way of sowing misinformation and confusion among U.S. analysts," but that U.S. officials stated it was unclear what Kislyak would have gained by falsely reporting such an encounter at a time when the Kremlin was envisioning improved diplomatic relations under the incoming Trump administration.[110] The New York Times reported that it had confirmed Kislyak's report with three officials and that the White House declined to comment on the report.[111] Former acting CIA Director John E. McLaughlin comments "[I]f an American intelligence officer had done anything like this, we'd consider it espionage.[112][113]
On May 27, 2017, Reuters published that Kushner had three previously undisclosed contacts with Kislyak, including two phone calls from April 2016 to November 2016, citing seven current and former U.S. officials. Jamie Gorelick, Kushner's attorney, told Reuters that Kushner had participated in "thousands of calls in this time period" and did not recall any with Kislyak.[114]
See also
References
Neither of them are Republicans... [Kushner] is a Democrat whose dad, Charles, was a bigtime donor to the Democratic Party, including Hillary Clinton's 2000 Senate campaign.
- Parker, Ned; Landay, Jonathan (May 27, 2017). "Exclusive: Trump son-in-law had undisclosed contacts with Russian envoy - sources". Reuters. Retrieved May 27, 2017.
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Jared Kushner. |
- "Citizen Kushner" - article in the New York Times, June 24, 2011
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Brian Deese |
Senior Advisor to the President 2017–present |
Incumbent |
| New office | Director of the Office of American Innovation 2017–present |
Incumbent |
Categories:
- 1981 births
- 21st-century American businesspeople
- American chairmen of corporations
- American chief executives
- American financiers
- American investors
- American newspaper publishers (people)
- American Orthodox Jews
- American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent
- American political fundraisers
- American real estate businesspeople
- Businesspeople from New Jersey
- Businesspeople from New York City
- Harvard University alumni
- Kushner family
- Living people
- New Jersey Democrats
- New York Democrats
- New York Observer people
- New York University School of Law alumni
- People from Livingston, New Jersey
- Trump family
- New York Independents
Kushner co-founded Cadre in 2014... To get off the ground, Cadre turned to a Goldman Sachs fund and a number of high-profile investors... Cadre also secured a $250 million line of credit from the family office of George Soros... Soros' family office is also an investor in Cadre.
. Wall Street Journal. p. 1. Kushner ... is currently in business with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and billionaires George Soros and Peter Thiel, according to people familiar with the matter and securities filings.
Kushner did not list his part-ownership in a real-estate start-up called Cadre, whose investors include a Goldman Sachs fund ... and George Soros, the Democratic megadonor and favorite target of the Trumpian base.
‘There was no way anybody in the administrative office of the school thought he would on the merits get into Harvard,’ a former school official told me. ‘His GPA did not warrant it, his SAT scores did not warrant it.’
Charles and Seryl Kushner were both on [Harvard’s Committee on University Resources]... His sons Jared and Joshua had both enrolled there... In 1998 ... [Charles] had pledged $2.5m to Harvard ... [and] also visited Neil Rudenstine, then Harvard president, and discussed funding a scholarship program for low- and middle-income students.
Kushner was vice president of 10 corporations as an undergrad, each of which operated as a part of Kushner Companies... Richard Stadtmauer, Jared Kushner’s uncle and the only other vice president ... listed in publicly available documents, was convicted of felony tax fraud in 2009 and sentenced to 38 months...
The elder Kushner hired a prostitute to entrap his brother-in-law and sent the tape to his sister, Esther, in an alleged effort to stop her from being a witness against him in a civil interfamily suit.
The U.S. Department of Justice charged the quartet with setting up a scheme to create false partnership tax returns for the Kushner Companies properties.
A jury ultimately convicted him of conspiracy and assisting in the filing of false tax returns. He was acquitted on nine other counts.
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner ... will remain the beneficiaries of a sprawling real estate and investment business, ... according to ethics filings... The filing ... does not provide information on his business partners or lenders to his projects. His real estate firm has borrowed money from the likes of Goldman Sachs...
The Real Deal created a scorecard estimating how much in profits (or losses) all of the parties involved in 666 Fifth Avenue have walked away with. • Kushner Companies. Retail: Estimated profits of about $100 to $120 million. Office: Estimated current loss ... of more than $200 million.
Josh ... and Jared also cofounded Cadre, an online platform for investing in real estate, in 2014. Two years later, it raised $50 million from a group of big-name investors including Goldman Sachs ... billionaire George Soros's private equity firm and Russian billionaire tech investor Yuri Milner.
George Soros' Soros Fund Management has quietly been financing the Kushner-backed real estate finance startup Cadre with a substantial credit line, according to sources familiar with the matter.
Kushner went to a private Jewish high school and then to Harvard (a 2006 book about college admissions would later single out Kushner as a prime example of how children of wealthy donors get preferential treatment...).
Total Disbursements
Trump today announced Jared Kushner will serve as Senior Advisor to the President... Kushner, a widely respected businessman and real estate developer was instrumental in formulating and executing the strategy behind President-elect Trump’s historic victory...
…serving as Assistant to the President and Senior Advisor.
By Democracy 21's analysis, Kushner faces two huge conflict-of-interest hurdles... The legal hurdle involves China... The federal conflict-of-interest laws cover not only Kushner's own holdings but also his spouse's holdings — in this case, trademarks and other business activities in China.
Ambassador Sergey Kislyak reported to his superiors in Moscow that Kushner, son-in-law and confidant to then-President-elect Trump, made the proposal during a meeting on Dec. 1 or 2 at Trump Tower, according to intercepts of Russian communications that were reviewed by U.S. officials. Kislyak said Kushner suggested using Russian diplomatic facilities in the United States for the communications.
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