Former Obama deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said Jared Kushner has engaged in a “level of corruption that we’ve just never seen” and it has been “hiding in plain sight.”
Rhodes comments come after the New York Times reported that nearly every cent of Kushner’s $3 billion investment fund came from foreign sources that he worked with when he served as a senior adviser in the Trump White House.
“This is just putting a price tag on American foreign policy,” Rhodes told MSNBC this week. “This is a level of corruption that we’ve just never seen and it’s hiding in plain sight.”
Kushner’s investment firm received a $2 billion from the Saudi-backed Public Investment Fund, which is controlled by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Rhodes said the Saudis did not invest $2 billion in Kushner’s private equity firm, Affinity Partners, because they trusted his investing prowess.
In fact, the Times previously reported that the panel that screens investments for the Saudi sovereign wealth fund expressed concerns about Kushner’s firm. Among their concerns were, “inexperience[d]” management and the possibility of the kingdom bearing most of the investment risk.
“I mean, look, this is not subtle corruption that we’re looking at. This is a guy, Jared Kushner, who had no expertise, no qualification whatsoever to be in the White House,” Rhodes said. “While he was there, he made it his account to work in the Gulf Arab states. He basically helped lead the cover-up for MBS. Get him in from the cold after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.”
“They’re making an investment on what they think he can do for them if there is a second Trump term,” he added. “Basically what we can take from that investment is that in a second Trump term US foreign policy in the Middle East and around the world will be made entirely with the interest of Mohammed bin Salman in mind.”
