WASHINGTON –
Donald Trump’s luxury hotel near the White House, which attracts lobbyists and diplomats seeking support for the former president and criticism as a symbol of his moral conflict. he is being sold to an investment group in Miami, according to published reports citing anonymous sources.
CGI Merchant Group has agreed to pay the Trump Organization $375 million for the rights to the 263-room hotel and plans to rename it the Waldorf Astoria, according to The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, citing reports from The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. knowledgeable source about Van De.
Neither the Trump Organization nor the CGI responded to multiple requests for comment.
According to the Journal, the deal is expected to close early next year, after which the hotel will be managed by the Waldorf Astoria under a separate agreement made by CGI. The Waldorf Astoria business is owned by Hilton Worldwide Holdings.
The hotel has been a huge loss for the Trump family since they won the right to convert a stately federal building called the Old Post Office from the federal government under a lease, with extensions , which can last nearly 100 years.
The federal agency that owns the property, the United States General Services Administration, must sign any sale.
The Trump Organization poured $200 million into transforming it into a luxury hotel that opened in late 2016, just before Trump became president. It then went on to lose more than $70 million over four years, according to audited reports obtained by a House committee investigating Trump’s conflicts of interest with the business. The losses came even before the pandemic resulted in closures, affecting the hotel industry.
Ethics experts urged Trump to sell hotels and other business properties before he took office, but Trump refused and hotels quickly became a magnet for the powerful and power-seeking. Powers: Industry lobbyists trying to shape policy, Republican politicians looking for president, and diplomats from Azerbaijan, the Philippines, Kuwait and other countries .
Flicking through all of his glittering hallway dinners is the question: How are Trump’s decisions a few blocks away in the Oval Office shaped by his financial interests and, right now even if not, why risk tarnishing U.S. policy with even the appearance of conflict?
Trump has dismissed such worries, saying he is too busy running his business and preoccupied with making money from his office. The Trump Organization has promised to send checks to the U.S. Treasury Department each year equal to profits from foreign government patrons, a response to criticism that he has violated the symbolic provision of the U.S. Constitution. United States law prohibits gifts from foreign governments.
“The Trump Hotel in DC stands like a bright neon sign telling foreigners and money-grabs how to bribe the president and a stark reminder to Americans that his decisions with as president is just as good for him as it is for ours.” Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, an oversight group. “Sell it now when he’s lost his job and dry, to say the least, too little, too late.”
The buyer, CGI, manages $325 million from wealthy families, entertainers and sports figures, investing in office buildings and hotels and other types of real estate, according to its website. surname. Additionally, the company partnered late last year with baseball star Alex Rodriguez and another investment firm to start a $650 million fund to buy hotels and convert them into the Hilton brand.
CGI has also launched a “socially conscious” hotel chain that donates to local charities, supports local businesses and buys eco-friendly products. In September, they announced they would be opening a hotel in Miami with a glass-bottomed pool overlooking the Atlantic Ocean called Gabriel South Beach as part of their socially conscious offerings. The hotel will be part of the Curio Collection, a Hilton chain.
The head of the company, Raoul Thomas, a native of Jamaica, has donated heavily to Democratic politicians, including Joe Biden’s campaign. He is a senior board member of the National Association of Black Hotel Owners. His company invested $30 million in Morris Brown College in Atlanta for a hotel and restaurant training program at the historic Blacks educational institution in Atlanta.
It is not clear how much money the Trump family made from the sale as the terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Hotel sales sometimes include “earning out,” where the seller is only given all of the money promised if the buyer meets certain financial goals in the years after the transaction closes.
The Trump family originally hoped to raise $500 million for the hotel when it first went on the market in the fall of 2019. It was withdrawn from the market, then brought back this year.
Some hotel experts were surprised by the reported deal rates given so few businessmen, tourists and lobbyists come to Washington.
Bill Collins, executive vice president at commercial real estate brokerage Cushman Wakefield, said the $1 million equivalent price per room is “top dollar” in the industry. At that preliminary valuation, the Trump hotel would be worth no more than $263 million, nearly $100 million less than it was reported to be.
“They’ve poured too much money into it and can’t increase occupancy,” he told the AP last month. “Can someone manage it better? Maybe, but only mildly.”
