President Donald Trump’s top financial hack has defended his $1 billion crypto windfall.
Trump, 80, revealed earlier this week that he earned over $1 billion from his family’s crypto side hustles last year, after the U.S. Office of Government Ethics released his annual financial disclosure on Tuesday.
Immediate concerns sprang up, with critics asserting that Trump has used the presidency to enrich himself. But Scott Bessent, Trump’s hand-picked Treasury Secretary, has claimed he sees no conflict of interest.
“I don’t think there’s an appearance problem,” Bessent, who served as an economic adviser, fundraiser, and major donor for Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, told CBS News on Thursday.
Indeed, the White House stuck to a similar line when grilled by the Daily Beast. “As President Trump said, he has a lot of assets because he was a massively successful businessman prior to becoming President, which was why he was elected to office in the first place,” spokesperson Anna Kelly told the Beast on Thursday.
“All of the President’s assets are held in fully discretionary accounts managed by independent third-party financial institutions. There are no conflicts of interest.”
She appeared to be referring to an interview with reporters in North Dakota on Wednesday, where Trump attempted to explain away the windfall.
“I’ve made a lot of money before I became president, and they invest my money, and I don’t talk to them. I never—I don’t even speak to them,” Trump said before boarding a brand-new Air Force One. “Them” are his unnamed financial advisers who apparently do his bidding.
“This is an innovation presidency,” Bessent told CBS News. “So whether it’s digital access, whether it’s AI, whether it’s everything that is going on in the tech ecosystem that, you know, all Americans are benefiting from that.”
Speaking to Anderson Cooper on CNN’s 360 on Thursday, the president’s niece, Mary Trump, said she was “unfortunately” not surprised by the payout, or the fact that he took possession of a $400 million Qatari-gifted luxury jet.
“This is from a history of corruption,” Mary said, referencing her family. “At least Donald comes by it honestly, my grandfather also engaged in all sorts of illicit financial schemes to increase his wealth and… Donald… continued in that tradition.”
