The co-leader of Scotland’s Green Party (also known as the Scottish Greens) has called upon the country’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon to use an unexplained wealth order (UWO) to investigate Donald Trump’s private business activities in the country. The Scotsman reports that Patrick Harvie believes Trump’s multimillion dollar acquisition of lands in Scotland is suspicious enough to warrant the use of an UWO, telling news outlets that “Trump is a politically exposed person in terms of the law, and there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that he, or people he is connected with, have been involved in serious crime. Some of them have pleaded guilty.”
First Minister Sturgeon told The Scotsman that while she was not a supporter of Trump, she felt any criminal activity he may or may not be involved in should be handled by the Scottish police, not the country’s legislative body. Harvie disagrees, saying that it is foreign business interests like Donald Trump’s company that the law was created for.
The unexplained wealth order was introduced in 2018, as a power that would force suspected corrupt foreign officials or their families to disclose the “source for their riches,” allowing Scottish authorities to seize those properties if a court finds they have committed crimes.
The BBC reports that the Greens’ Harvie is citing evidence, brought up during the investigations into Trump’s organization and its ties to Russia, where suggestions were made that the golf courses Trump bought up between 2012 and 2014 “may have been used for money laundering.”
Trump and his family have denied these allegations in the past, and Eric Trump told the BBC that the claims had “no basis in fact.” Of course, this could be true, but Harvie and others would like to use their government’s autonomous right to execute its own legal decisions. On Thursday, speaking in front of the Scottish Parliament, Harvie explained that there are big questions as to where the orange white supremacist maybe-billionaire got all of the money he used to buy everything he bought in Scotland.
"Trump's known sources of income don't explain where the money came from for these huge cash transactions. There are reasonable grounds for suspecting that his lawfully obtained income was insufficient." Harvie also pointed out that Trump’s golf courses aren’t making any money. in fact, they are making the opposite of money.
According to Sturgeon’s spokesperson, a decision on whether or not to apply for an unexplained wealth order is made by the Civil Recovery Unit, which in turn reports to the Lord Advocate. A similar application was asked for and passed on to the Lord Advocate last year on behalf of people who campaigned for it.
The hard fact of the matter is that Scotland, like many western countries, is a bit at the mercy of Trump and the United States, as our business is so very important to them. The Scottish government has even tried to figure out ways to game this corrupt administration in to giving Scotland business by pointing out to U.S. military, in brochures for their airports, that Trump’s resorts are nearby.