The Trump Foundation has been sketchy from the day it launched in 1988. The board of directors consist of the Trump family members Don Sr., Eric, Donald Jr., Ivanka, and Trump Organization CEO Allen Weisselberg, who recently received immunity and is currently cooperating with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office. The so-called charity has no office, no staff and the board hasn’t met since 1999. Donald Trump himself hasn’t even made a single donation to his own charity since 2008. Not a penny. While some outside the Trump family were donating to it, the Trump family was using the fund to pay for events held at . . . you guessed it—Trump properties.
New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood began investigating the Trump Foundation after stellar reporting from Washington Post reporter David Fahrenthold detailed the questionable spending of the charity—$264,631 to renovate a fountain outside Trump's Plaza hotel, buying two large portraits of Trump that were displayed at Trump properties, settling legal disputes. The list went on and on.
In June 2018, AG Underwood filed suit seeking to close down the foundation due to “persistently illegal conduct.” Today the Trump family has announced they will be shutting it down and distributing any remaining funds. From The Washington Post:
The attorney general’s suit, filed in June, alleged “persistently illegal conduct” at the charity and sought to have the foundation shut down. Underwood is continuing to seek more than $2.8 million in restitution and has asked a judge to ban the Trumps temporarily from serving on the boards of other New York nonprofits.
Underwood said Tuesday that her investigation found “a shocking pattern of illegality involving the Trump Foundation — including unlawful coordination with the Trump presidential campaign, repeated and willful self-dealing, and much more.”
It’s just another long-running Trump crime family enterprise coming to a close.
And in case you were wondering, the Clinton Foundation is still going strong, doing great work around the world, earning 4 out of 4 stars on Charity Navigator.