Kushner faces House Judiciary inquiry over Gulf financial ties
House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries met with Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, to discuss possible areas of collaboration, according to a Sunday news report cited by The Guardian. Jeffries is expected to become speaker if Democrats retake the House majority in the November midterm elections, and his party has signaled it would use the chamber’s oversight authority to scrutinize the Trump administration, including the president’s personal finances and those of his family.
The Guardian reported “longstanding conflict-of-interest concerns about the way Kushner has continued to make money from foreign nations as he works on foreign affairs, including conflicts in Ukraine, Iran and Gaza.” Kushner has served as a special envoy for peace.
In April, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee opened an investigation into Kushner’s financial entanglements, focused on his private fundraising from Gulf nations during his time as a special envoy. Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the panel, wrote in an April letter to Kushner that he could not “both be a diplomat and a financial pawn of the Saudi monarchy at the same time.” Raskin added that Kushner could not “faithfully represent the United States with billions of dollars in Saudi and Emirati cash burning a hole in every pocket of every suit you own.”
Reactions to the Sunday report highlighted differing views within the Democratic Party over how to engage the Trump administration. Tommy Vietor, a former aide to President Barack Obama and co-host of the left-leaning podcast Pod Save America, wrote on social media that “Jared Kushner has no actual government job he just uses his family connections to get money from gulf autocrats and fund corrupt deals.” He added that the only way Jeffries should work with Kushner is “with demands for documents and subpoenas.”
Former Illinois Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger, who served on a House committee that investigated the Capitol attack, posted: “Make this make sense,” tagging Jeffries.
Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, offered a different response during an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. “I’m in favor of people meeting with whoever they want to discuss ideas,” Van Hollen said. “But it’s one thing to have a meeting. It’s another thing to see something real come out of that.”
In his written statement, Jeffries characterized the meeting as part of his party’s push on affordability. “Throughout this Congress, Republicans have adopted a my-way-or-the-highway approach to governing that has failed the American people,” Jeffries said. “To stop the madness, we have repeatedly made clear that an extremist approach will not work and will be met with forceful opposition.” He added: “The American people want bold change and that’s what House Democrats will deliver. In every conversation that we have with the Trump administration, we will continue to make it explicitly clear that the affordability crisis is not a hoax and nothing short of transformational policy change is acceptable. We are fighting for an affordable America. The question is whether Republicans will join us.”
Not every Democrat has taken a confrontational posture toward Trump. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, has pursued a more collaborative approach to working with the administration in its second term.
The reaction to the Jeffries-Kushner meeting underscored the appetite among Democrats for aggressive oversight of Trump during the final two years of his second term, should they win the House — a posture that complicates any outreach from Jeffries to figures in the president’s orbit.