Washington Post obtains internal donor list of 67 contributions; Trump's name absent despite pledge

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US President Donald Trump points toward the White House ballroom construction site on Thursday (local time). [AP]
US President Donald Trump points toward the White House ballroom construction site on Thursday (local time). [AP]

A White House ballroom construction project championed by President Donald Trump has drawn $333 million in donations, with the donor list including Big Tech giants Nvidia and Apple as well as a family member of someone Trump pardoned — fueling conflict-of-interest concerns.

According to donor records and internal documents obtained by The Washington Post, the largest pledges — $25 million each — came from Nvidia, Apple, the Adelson family (a major Republican donor network), and Charles Ergen, the billionaire co-founder and chairman of satellite and wireless company Dish Network.

The list, current as of late last month, covers 67 contributions of $10,000 or more, recording the source, date and amount of each.

Google contributed $22 million as a settlement of a lawsuit Trump filed against YouTube, while a foundation tied to Isaac Perlmutter, the former CEO of Marvel Entertainment, and his wife donated $20.27 million.

Defense contractor Lockheed Martin, data analytics firm Palantir and Microsoft each pledged $10 million. Amazon, Caterpillar, Comcast and T-Mobile committed $5 million or more apiece.

Cryptocurrency firms and investors pledged more than $18 million in total. Among them, the Winklevoss twins — founders of crypto exchange Gemini — donated $5 million worth of bitcoin.

Within the Trump administration, Small Business Administration chief Kelly Loeffler and her husband Jeff Sprecher, former chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, pledged $5 million. Brandon Lutnick, chairman of investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald and son of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, donated shares valued at more than $2.5 million.

Joseph Popolo Jr., the US ambassador to the Netherlands, and his wife contributed $1 million from a family fund.

Trump said he would donate as well, but his name does not appear on the list, the Post noted.

Donations are routed to a White House account through the National Mall Trust, a Washington nonprofit. Nonprofits are not required to disclose donor identities, and most contributors — including Nvidia — requested anonymity, the Post reported.

The Post described the documents as revealing "a fundraising effort that is without precedent in its scale and opacity."

The paper added that while "no direct link has been established between the pledges and favorable actions by the Trump administration," the "overwhelming majority of donations came from companies and wealthy individuals with interests before the federal government."

Nvidia became the top donor just three months after the government cleared it to sell advanced semiconductors to China, and the cryptocurrency industry has benefited from deregulation under the Trump administration, the Post noted.

Ambassador Popolo joined the donor list just two months after receiving Senate confirmation.

Julio Herrera Velutini, an Italian-Venezuelan dual national financier facing bribery charges in the United States, received a presidential pardon from Trump earlier this year. His daughter Isabella had pledged $2.5 million in September last year.

Dish Network Chairman Ergen's donation came after a Federal Communications Commission investigation into parent company EchoStar was dropped in May last year.

An SPC linked to housing, financial and technology company Rocket pledged $10 million after the government approved Rocket's acquisition of two competitors last year.

Others who made pledges include Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, whose company significantly expanded its federal contracts under the second Trump administration; billionaire financier Paul Singer, who has interests tied to the Venezuelan oil market; and Harold Hamm, honorary chairman of oil and gas company Continental Resources, the Post reported.

White House communications official Davis Ingle pushed back in a statement to the Post, saying critics "falsely alleging conflicts of interest would have complained equally if American taxpayers had been forced to foot the bill for this long-overdue renovation." Ingle added that the White House would "relentlessly pursue this cowardly leak" while continuing to protect all donors.


mokiya@heraldcorp.com