'Unprecedented kleptocracy' Bernie Sanders says Trump made $4 billion off the presidency

Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders on Thursday shared a scathing post about President Donald Trump's alleged profiteering from the presidency. Citing a January report from The New Yorker, Sanders said that Trump and his family made over $4 billion in the first year of his second term in an act of what he called "unprecedented kleptocracy." Criticism of Trump profiting from the presidency has grown recently, with allegations of the administration favoring companies associated with his family. 

Trump's family business, led by Eric and his brother, Donald Jr., has expanded into cryptocurrencies and other ventures, raising questions about whether they have profited from Trump being in office. In his report, writer David Kirkpatrick claimed that at the start of his second term at the White House, Trump was in a financially "tight spot" but within months of taking office, his situation drastically improved. Kirkpatrick did a full accounting, noting the various cryptocurrency investments and trades that benefited from Trump's benevolent policies. Since taking office, Trump has shown strong support for cryptocurrency, signing the GENIUS Act to foster digital asset growth and create a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve.

Citing his calculations, Sanders in his post claimed that Trump's revenue from crypto alone stood at $3.02 billion. The report mentioned that the gains come from Eric and Donald Trump Jr.'s stake in companies such as American Bitcoin and the family's World Liberty Financial (stablecoin/ AltSigma5). Senator Elizabeth Warren sounded the alarm on Trump's crypto moves last year at a Senate Banking Committee hearing, claiming Trump had made it impossible to talk about cryptocurrency legislation that doesn't address his grift.  “If Congress is going to ratify a sweeping crypto regulatory regime, it is critical we shut down the President’s superhighway of crypto corruption,” she said.

Sanders further cited income from other sources, including deals in the Persian Gulf, which he claimed to be worth $425.8 million, a Qatari jet allegedly worth $150 million, and income of $125 million from his Mar-a-Lago estate, which, according to Forbes, is worth $564 million, among others. While the report is over two months old, the allegations have continued to stack up, as most recently, Trump's son came under fire after a Silicon Valley robotics company, Foundation Future Industries, bagged a $24 million defense contract. While Eric Trump, who serves as the chief strategy advisor at the company, boasted that the firm was helping America win the race to develop humanoids for the military, on Fox Business' "Mornings with Maria", Warren claimed that it was "corruption in plain sight". 

Meanwhile, the White House and the Trump Organization have continued to deny any ethical problems associated with crypto and other deals. Recently, when Donald Jr. was asked bout the crypto conflict of interest, he responded saying the issue had "Frankly, it's gotten old," as per PBS. Furthermore, the Trump Organization stated that it is "fully compliant with all applicable ethics and conflicts of interest laws," and the implication that politics is involved in enriching the family is "unfounded", the publication reported.