MALAYSIA
In September 2017, then-President Trump hosted then-Prime Minister of Malaysia, Najib Razak, for an official visit at the White House.503 At the time, the DOJ was seeking to recover more than $1 billion in assets that had been stolen from a Malaysian government investment fund co-founded and managed by Mr. Razak in one of the largest global corruption scandals to date.504 The Prime Minister and numerous Malaysian officials stayed at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., during the official visit. Officials would return to the hotel for an additional stay later that month. Their room charges and amenities totaled $248,962 for the month of September 2017.505 It was widely reported that, as part of a broader corruption investigation, Prime Minister Razak was under scrutiny by the DOJ at the time he was invited to the White House.506 Commentators noted that then-President Trump’s decision to welcome Prime Minister Razak anyway could have been seen as lending credibility to Mr. Razak, who was required to call a general election no later than mid-2018 and was expected to run for re-election.507
Malaysia’s Emolument Spending at Trump Properties
Date
Location
Expenditure
Amount
September 7–15, 2017
Trump International Hotel
(Washington, D.C.)
Stay by former Prime Minister Najib Razak and other senior government officials
$247,352508
September 27, 2017
Trump International Hotel
(Washington, D.C.)
“Embassy of Malaysia Delegation”
$1,610509
EMOLUMENTS PAID BY MALAYSIA
(2017–2020)
$248,962
503 Trump Welcomes Najib Razak, the Malaysian Leader, as President, and Owner of a Fine Hotel, New York Times (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2017/09/12/world/asia/trump-najib-razak-malaysia-white-househtml).
504 Malaysian Leader, Under Corruption Cloud, Will Meet with Trump, New York Times (Sept. 9, 2017) (online at www.nytimes.com/2017/09/09/world/asia/m ... k-1mdbhtml).
505 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008052 to MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008094.
506 Trump Welcomes Najib Razak, the Malaysian Leader, as President, and Owner of a Fine Hotel, New York Times (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2017/09/12/world/asia/trump-najib-razak-malaysia-white-househtml); Trump To Meet Malaysia's Leader As Probe Against Him Deepens, NPR (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.npr.org/2017/09/12/550352981/trump- ... im-deepens).
507 Trump Meeting with Malaysian Prime Minister Comes Under Scrutiny, PBS News Hour (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.pbs.org/newshour/world/trump-meetin ... s-scrutiny); Trump Meets with Malaysia’s Prime Minister, NBC News (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-meet ... er-n800601).
508 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008052 to MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008094; MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008012.
509 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018425.
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1Malaysia Development Berhad Corruption Scandal
On September 12, 2017, then-Prime Minister Razak visited then-President Trump at the White House. At the time of the meeting, it was publicly known that Mr. Razak and members of his family were under investigation by the DOJ in connection with the now notorious corruption scandal involving the misappropriation of billions of dollars from a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund called 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).510 Mr. Razak had been under “unrelenting pressure at home” ahead of his anticipated re-election campaign, according to the New York Times, which described the White House visit as a “major victory” for him.511 The Center for Strategic and International Studies similarly noted that no Malaysian Prime Minister had visited the White House since 2004 and explained that:
[T]he Malaysian prime minister will likely be happy if his visit demonstrates back in Malaysia—where he faces elections before August 2018—that the U.S. investigation is really a relatively minor issue and that he can still be welcomed into Trump’s Oval Office as an important Southeast Asian leader.512
By the time the two leaders met, the DOJ’s investigation into 1MDB—which would become its “largest ever kleptocracy” case—had been underway for more than a year.513 The DOJ alleged that Mr. Razak and others associated with the fund had illegally siphoned off more than $3.5 billion from 1MDB beginning not long after it was created in 2009—shortly after Mr. Razak, a co-founder of the fund, took office.514 It would later be found that more than $4.5 billion had been stolen from 1MDB, which the DOJ determined to have been laundered through shell companies and financial institutions worldwide, many of which were in the United States.515
510 Trump Meets Malaysia Leader Under Investigation by His Justice Department, CNN (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.cnn.com/2017/09/12/politics/trump-m ... /indexhtml).
511 Trump Welcomes Najib Razak, the Malaysian Leader, as President, and Owner of a Fine Hotel, New York Times (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2017/09/12/world/asia/trump-najib-razak-malaysia-white-househtml); Malaysian Leader, Under Corruption Cloud, Will Meet with Trump, New York Times (Sept. 9, 2017) (online at www.nytimes.com/2017/09/09/world/asia/m ... -1mdb.html).
512 Center for Strategic and International Studies, Trump-Najib Meeting Gives Malaysia-U.S. Relations Shot of Adrenaline (Sept. 14, 2017) (online at www.csis.org/analysis/trump-najib-meeti ... adrenaline).
513 Explainer: Malaysia’s Ex-PM Najib And the Multi-Billion Dollar 1MDB Scandal, Reuters (Aug. 23, 2022) (online at www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/mala ... 022-08-23/); Malaysian Leader, Under Corruption Cloud, Will Meet with Trump, New York Times (Sept. 9, 2017) (online at www.nytimes.com/2017/09/09/world/asia/m ... -1mdb.html).
514 Complaint, United States of America v. “The Wolf of Wall Street” Motion Picture etc., No. CV 16-16-5362 (C.D. Cal. July 20, 2016) (online at www.justice.gov/archives/opa/page/file/877166/download); Former Malaysian Leader to Serve Prison Term After Final Appeal Is Thrown Out, CNN (Aug. 23, 2022) (online at www.cnn.com/2022/08/23/asia/malaysia-na ... /indexhtml).
515 Department of Justice, Press Release: Over $1 Billion in Misappropriated 1MDB Funds Now Repatriated to Malaysia (Aug. 5, 2021) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/over-1-billion-m ... d-malaysia); 1MDB Scandal Explained: A Tale of Malaysia’s Missing Billions, The Guardian (July 28, 2020) (online at www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/25/1 ... g-billions).
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Beginning in 2016, the DOJ filed 41 civil forfeiture actions in an effort to recover the more than $1 billion in stolen 1MDB assets that were known to have been laundered in violation of U.S. law.516 Of the assets the DOJ identified as having been laundered at the time, more than $730 million had allegedly been deposited into accounts that belonged to Mr. Razak, who was not named in the DOJ’s case but was referenced as “Malaysian Official 1” in its complaints. The billions in stolen funds were allegedly used to purchase fine art, a yacht, and luxury American properties, and even to invest in the film “The Wolf of Wall Street.” This was quite plainly far from the intended purpose of the sovereign wealth fund, which the DOJ pointed out was “ostensibly created … for the economic benefit of the Malaysian people.”517 The DOJ also brought several highly-publicized criminal actions against individuals and a financial institution based on their participation in the scheme.518
Against the backdrop of the 1MDB scandal, then-Prime Minister Razak used his September 2017 meeting with President Trump to paint a positive picture of the country’s investments in the United States, which garnered praise from Mr. Trump. Mr. Razak bragged that a Malaysian pension fund and a sovereign wealth fund—separate from the one he was accused of looting—were investing billions of dollars in the U.S. economy. Then-President Trump, in turn, said it was a “great honor” to host Mr. Razak and “his very distinguished delegation” as “Malaysia is a massive investor in the United States in the form of stocks and bonds.” The pair avoided any mention of the then-pending DOJ investigation.519
Malaysian Human Rights Violations
At the time of the September 2017 meeting with then-President Trump, then-Prime Minister Razak’s human rights record was also under scrutiny. By 2017, Mr. Razak had become an increasingly autocratic ruler, with Human Rights Watch decrying the “increased arrests of
516 Department of Justice, Press Release: Over $1 Billion in Misappropriated 1MDB Funds Now Repatriated to Malaysia (Aug. 5, 2021) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/over-1-billion-m ... d-malaysia ).
517 Complaint, United States of America v. “The Wolf of Wall Street” Motion Picture etc., No. CV 16-16-5362 (C.D. Cal. July 20, 2016) (online at www.justice.gov/archives/opa/page/file/877166/download); Malaysian Leader, Under Corruption Cloud, Will Meet with Trump, New York Times (Sept. 9, 2017) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2017/09/09/world/asia/malaysia-najib-razak-1mdb.html); Explainer: Malaysia’s Ex-PM Najib and the Multi-Billion Dollar 1MDB Scandal, Reuters (Aug. 23, 2022) (online at www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/mala ... 022-08-23/).
518 Department of Justice, Press Release: Former Goldman Sachs Investment Banker Convicted in Massive Bribery and Money Laundering Scheme (Apr. 8, 2022) (online at www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/former-gol ... laundering); Department of Justice, Press Release: Goldman Sachs Charged in Foreign Bribery Case and Agrees to Pay Over $2.9 Billion (Oct. 22, 2020) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/goldman-sachs-ch ... 29-billion).
519 Trump Welcomes Najib Razak, the Malaysian Leader, as President, and Owner of a Fine Hotel, New York Times (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2017/09/12/world/asia/trump-najib-razak-malaysia-white-househtml); From Trump Hotel Lobby to White House, Malaysian Prime Minister Gets VIP Treatment, Washington Post (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.washingtonpost.com/politics/from-tr ... story.html).
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government critics, expanded restrictions on peaceful assembly, and continued impunity for police abuses” in Malaysia.
520 In particular, then-Prime Minister Razak was jailing individuals who commented on the 1MDB scandal. Human Rights Watch found:
Throughout 2016, Malaysian authorities used the Communications and Multimedia Act (CMA) and the Sedition Act to arrest those criticizing the administration of Prime Minister Najib Razak, commenting on the government’s handling of the 1 Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) corruption scandal, or making comments on social media deemed ‘insulting’ to Najib or to Malaysia’s royalty.521
Experts and human rights groups warned that then-Prime Minister Razak’s visit to the White House was a public relations coup for him, with one commentator noting that Mr. Razak “can tell Malaysians that the 1MDB is a non-issue and that the opposition’s message that he is unwelcome by world leaders is not true,” while another predicted that “Najib will use this White House visit to burnish his credentials going into next year’s election in Malaysia, and redouble his repression of critics using the stamp of approval from this visit.”522
Emoluments Paid by Malaysia to Trump-Owned Businesses
In the days before and after the White House meeting, from September 7, 2017, to September 15, 2017, a Malaysian delegation including then-Prime Minister Razak stayed at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., and were charged a “direct bill” of $247,352. Mr. Razak stayed in the hotel’s presidential suite, which was billed at $10,000 per night. Costs accrued by then-Prime Minister Razak alone totaled $44,562 over three nights and four days.523 Part of the bill for Mr. Razak’s stay is excerpted below:524
520 Human Rights Watch, Malaysia: Rights Decline Under Najib (Jan. 12, 2017) (online at wwwhrw.org/news/2017/01/12/malaysia-rights-decline-under-najib).
521 Id.
522 Trump Meeting with Malaysian Prime Minister Comes Under Scrutiny, PBS News Hour (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.pbs.org/newshour/world/trump-meetin ... s-scrutiny); Trump Meets with Malaysia’s Prime Minister, NBC News (Sept. 12, 2017) (online at www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-meet ... er-n800601).
523 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008052 to MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00008094.
524 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT-COMMITTEE-00008081.
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Among the numerous charges for amenities Mr. Razak accrued during his stay at the Trump International Hotel were a $750 charge for “Furniture Movement (Dressing Room)” and a charge of $1,500 for a “Personal Trainer.” Mr. Razak also spent thousands of dollars to have a butler assist in serving multiple meals.525 The Malaysian delegation’s lavish spending in mid-September 2017 at the Trump International Hotel caused a 70% jump in the hotel’s average nightly room revenue—increasing to $97,193 for the nights of September 7 through September 14 compared to $56,635 for other nights in September 2017.526
Later that same month, on September 27, 2017, the “Embassy of Malaysia Delegation” would return to the hotel and rent an additional four rooms at a cost of $1,610.527
Adding to the hotel’s revenue during the Malaysian delegation’s mid-September stay was $9,272 that was spent by the U.S. Secret Service on rooms for the detail assigned to protect the delegation. The Secret Service’s room block included multiple rooms that were booked at $650 per night—more than double the government’s $231 per diem lodging rate for Washington, D.C.528
Lobbyist Spending
In addition to Malaysian government officials, Elliott Broidy, a former top fundraiser for Mr. Trump who was lobbying the Trump Administration on behalf of Malaysian interests as an unregistered foreign agent, also stayed at the Trump International Hotel four times during September 2017, including four nights during a Malaysian delegation’s visit in mid-September, and again on the night of September 27, when a Malaysian delegation again stayed at the property. In total, Mr. Broidy was charged $5,345 for rooms at the Trump International Hotel during September 2017.529 His associate, Nickie Lum Davis, who was working with him on behalf of Malaysia, also stayed at the hotel during part of the Malaysian delegation’s mid-September stay and was charged $1,155 for her stay.530
525 Id.
526 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018254 to MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018452.
527 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018425.
528 MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018309; MAZAR-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018318; MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018337; General Services Administration, FY 17 Per Diem Rates (online at www.gsa.gov/travel/plan-book/per-diem-r ... diem-files). Expenditures by the U.S. Secret Service have been redacted from the documents made public with this report out of an abundance of caution given the sensitivity of such information.
529 Elliott Broidy Pleads Guilty in Foreign Lobbying Case, New York Times, Oct. 20, 2020 (online at wwwnytimes.com/2020/10/20/us/politics/elliott-broidy-foreign-lobbying.html); Department of Justice, Press Release: Elliott Broidy Pleads Guilty for Back-Channel Lobbying Campaign to Drop 1MDB Investigation and Remove a Chinese Foreign National (Oct. 20, 2020) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/elliott-broidy-p ... gation-and); MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018254 to MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018452.
530MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018303; MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018311; MAZARS-OVERSIGHT_COMMITTEE-00018320; Department of Justice, Press Release: Hawaii Businesswoman Pleads Guilty to Facilitating Back-Channel Lobbying Campaign to Drop 1MDB Investigation and Remove a Foreign National to China (Aug. 31, 2020) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/hawaii-businesswoman-
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Mr. Broidy was also being paid millions by Malaysian financier Low Taek Jho, a fugitive whom the DOJ has charged with orchestrating the 1MDB scheme, to lobby the Trump Administration to close the investigation into 1MDB—an arrangement Mr. Broidy concealed from authorities.531 In October 2020, Mr. Broidy pled guilty to conspiring to violate FARA in connection with his undisclosed lobbying work for Malaysia.532 As of the date of this report, Mr. Low remains a fugitive after being charged in Malaysia and the United States for his alleged role in the 1MDB scheme.533
The DOJ press release announcing Mr. Broidy’s guilty plea detailed his efforts to persuade the Trump Administration to end its 1MDB investigation, noting that Mr. Broidy had, among other actions, “provided talking points to the Secretary of State referencing the 1MDB investigation in advance of a meeting between the Secretary of State and the Malaysian Prime Minister in August 2017,” the month before Mr. Razak’s visit with President Trump. The press release further explained that Mr. Broidy had “pushed the White House Chief of Staff for a golf game between the President and the Malaysian Prime Minister to allow the Malaysian Prime Minister to raise [a] resolution of the 1MDB investigation.”534
In August 2020, Ms. Lum Davis also pled guilty for her role in facilitating the unregistered lobbying campaign to end the 1MDB investigation, for which she too was paid millions of dollars.535
The effort by Mr. Broidy and his Malaysian co-conspirators to end the DOJ’s pursuit of the 1MDB funds ultimately failed. As of August 2021, the DOJ had successfully repatriated more than $1.2 billion to the Malaysian people.536 The Malaysian government prosecuted Mr.
pleads-guilty-facilitating-back-channel-lobbying-campaign-drop-1mdb).
531 Elliott Broidy Pleads Guilty in Foreign Lobbying Case, New York Times (Oct. 20, 2020) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2020/10/20/us/politics/elliott-broidy-foreign-lobbying.html); Malaysia in Talks to Bring Back 1MDB-Linked Fugitive Jho Low, Reuters (May 5, 2023) (online at wwwreuters.com/world/asia-pacific/malaysia-talks-bring-back-1mdb-linked-fugitive-jho-low-pm-2023-05-05/).
532 Department of Justice, Press Release: Elliott Broidy Pleads Guilty for Back-Channel Lobbying Campaign to Drop 1MDB Investigation and Remove a Chinese Foreign National (Oct. 20, 2020) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/elliott-broidy-p ... gation-and).
533 Malaysia in Talks to Bring Back 1MDB-Linked Fugitive Jho Low, Reuters (May 5, 2023) (online at wwwreuters.com/world/asia-pacific/malaysia-talks-bring-back-1mdb-linked-fugitive-jho-low-pm-2023-05-05/); Elliott Broidy Pleads Guilty in Foreign Lobbying Case, New York Times (Oct. 20, 2020) (online at wwwnytimes.com/2020/10/20/us/politics/elliott-broidy-foreign-lobbying.html).
534 Department of Justice, Press Release: Elliott Broidy Pleads Guilty for Back-Channel Lobbying Campaign to Drop 1MDB Investigation and Remove a Chinese Foreign National (Oct. 20, 2020) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/elliott-broidy-p ... gation-and).
535 Department of Justice, Press Release: Hawaii Businesswoman Pleads Guilty to Facilitating Back-Channel Lobbying Campaign to Drop 1MDB Investigation and Remove a Foreign National to China (Aug. 31, 2020) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/hawaii-businessw ... -drop-1mdb).
536 Department of Justice, Press Release: Over $1 Billion in Misappropriated 1MDB Funds Now Repatriated to Malaysia (Aug. 5, 2021) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/over-1-billion-m ... ated-1mdb-
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Razak for his role in the 1MDB scandal, and in August 2022, he was ordered to begin serving a 12-year prison sentence for his conviction on criminal charges related to 1MDB. According to Reuters, officials in Malaysia found that Razak ultimately “received more than $1 billion traceable to 1MDB.”
537
President Trump pardoned Mr. Broidy shortly before leaving office.538 He did not pardon Ms. Lum Davis, who was sentenced to two years in prison in January 2023.539
funds-now-repatriated-malaysia).
537 Explainer: Malaysia’s Ex-PM Najib and the Multi-Billion Dollar 1MDB Scandal, Reuters (Aug. 23, 2022) (online at www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/mala ... 022-08-23/).
538 With Hours Left in Office, Trump Grants Clemency to Bannon and Other Allies, New York Times (May 5, 2021) (online at www.nytimes.com/2021/01/20/us/politics/ ... ardonshtml).
539 Department of Justice, Press Release: Businesswoman Sentenced for Facilitating Unregistered Lobbying Campaign in Exchange for Approximately $3 Million (Jan. 19, 2023) (online at www.justice.gov/opa/pr/businesswoman-se ... ximately-3).
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