SPECIAL
Tracking Trump's Ascension to Becoming a Russian Asset
Part 2: Trump's Money Troubles
April 11, 2025 - Tyler, WTF America?
We last left off with Trump's first visit to Moscow. This visit was organized by Soviet Ambassador Yuri Dubinin and a Russian diplomat, Vitaly Churkin. Where Trump's initial ties to the Russian government were indirect through mafia ties, his first trip included the first direct connections between Trump and the Russian government.
Shortly after, Trump wanted to develop a hotel in Moscow. It never came to fruition and failed because under the Soviet Union, large hotels were centrally planned and there wasn't a private real estate market. Trump didn't want to invest any capital into the development and relied on external financing for his branded properties; he expected the Kremlin or foreign investors to foot the bill. That didn't happen, and shortly after, the Soviet Union collapsed and Russia went through an economic trough that made any large real estate projects untenable. On top of that, the Soviets likely didn't coordinate a trip from Trump for a real estate deal; they probably just wanted to gather blackmail material and investigate him as a willing or maniputable Russian asset.
By 1991, Trump was in serious financial trouble. He owed $1 billion in debt, his Atlantic City casinos were hemorrhaging money, and major US banks began cutting him off. To avoid bankruptcy, Trump negotiated a 1991 deal that allowed him to keep *some* of his assets while forfeiting control of others. As a result of this and his bankruptcies, mainstream US banks considered him too risky for loans.
Trump began shifting financing efforts to foreign investment as a result of his risk status with US banks - specifically Russian-speaking oligarchs. He began aggressively marketing Trump Tower NYC condos to oligarchs and foreign buyers, and took in many cash purchases through shell companies owned by Russian and former Soviet buyers. Translation: These were more money laundering schemes not unlike the aformentioned David Bogatin and Semion Mogilevich deal in 1984 where five Trump Tower condos were bought for $6 million - but across all Trump properties.
In the mid and late nineties when the Russian economy was in the gutter, oligarchs sought capital outside of Russia to protect their wealth, and Trump's real estate network offered a legitimate looking outlet with no requirement for financial disclosure. This is why Donald Trump Jr said “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets. We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia.” -- something the Mueller report also backed up. Here's why...
Felix Sater
Felix Sater is a Russian-born businessman born in Moscow who was convicted in 1998 of a stock fraud scheme tied to the Russian mob. Felix's dad, Mikhail Sater, was an associate of the Russian mafia with ties to Semion Mogilevich - someone we mentioned in Part 1.
Bayrock Group was Trump-tower based real estate firm founded by a Kazakh-Turkish businessman, Tevfik Arif. (So we're still dealing with former Soviet owners). Felix joined Bayrock Group in the earlier 2000's and worked as an intermediary to secure money laundering deals between Russian oligarchs and Trump real estate properties. Some projects the firm dealt with included Trump SoHo, Trump Fort Lauderdale, Trump Phoenix, and many more that were abandoned or failed.
To finance these projects prior to selling them to Russian oligarchs for money laundering, Trump turned to foreign banks to side step his risk issues with US banking institutions. One bank in particular Trump leaned on was Deutsche Bank. Deutsche was one of the only remaining banks willing to lend money to Trump. The bank's private wealth division facilitated many of Trump's loans which lacked the scrutiny of most banks' real estate divisions. If you've been following the news for the last ten years, you know Deutsche was investigated for numerous money laundering scandals. Another friend of Trump's, Jeffrey Epstein, also maintained accounts with Deutsche. The bank also had close ties to Russia; between 2011 and 2015, Deutsche Bank did 'mirror trades' where Russian blue-chip stocks were purchased in rubles and sold for identical quantities in London for US dollars, which allowed $10 billion USD to be laundered out of Russia. They were fined $425 million by the NY State Department of Financial Services and another 163 million pounds by the UK's Financial Conduct Authority. So we have a man who's getting financing from a bank with Russian ties to build properties to serve as money laundering operations for Russian oligarchs. After already having real estate clients get caught laundering money through Trump tower years earlier. Coincidence?
Here's another example of that type of laundering: Anatoly Golubchik and Vadim Trincher were in an illegal gambling ring, based out of Anatoly's apartment in Trump Tower. With illegal sports bettering, the organization laundered approximately $100 million in proceeds from gambling operations in Russia and Ukraine through shell companies and bank accounts in Cyprus, finally into the United States. This is exactly how Russian oligarchs transfered their capital out of Russia and into the United States to secure it in shady real estate deals. After a FBI raid in 2013 they were convicted of racketeering along with 30 more individuals. Before that, their network operated for decades through high-end real estate. Trincher lived in Trump Tower in a $5 million dollar apartment - directly under Trump's penthouse. One of the criminals indicted in that raid was Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov aka "Taiwanchik". Unlike the others, Taiwanchik evaded arrest and is still a fugitive. Seven months after the indictment, he was spotted in the VIP section of the Miss Universe pageant in Moscow - Donald Trump's pageant. It takes willful ignorance to not believe Trump’s aware or a participant in Russian mafia money laundering at this point. Other properties with Russian buyers and money laundering included Trump Palace, Trump Parc, and Trump International Hotel & Tower in Columbus Circle.
Anatoly Golubchik
Vadim Trincher
Alimzhan Tokhtakhunov
The money laundering ties between Russian oligarchs and Trump real estate continued. Between 2000 and 2015, Trump properties continued to see a huge influx of cash purchases from Russian and ex-soviet buyers.
A key example is Sunny Isles Beach, Florida where Trump Towers 1, 2, and 3 were. Because of the huge number of Russian buyers, this property was nicknamed "Little Moscow" or "Moscow on the Beach". In 2017, Reuters found that at least 63 Russian nationals bought condos in these buildings amounting to roughly $100 million.
Sunny Isles, Trump Tower 1-3
In part 3, we'll cover Trump's ties to Russia leading up to his first candidacy for president and up to present day. Stay tuned.
Story Sourcing
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Craig Unger, House of Trump, House of Putin
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https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-trump-property/