New investigations against Jared Kushner

Senate Democrats are launching a new investigation into foreign payments to Jared Kushner’s investment firm.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden announced the investigation on Wednesday, saying the panel would examine the billions of dollars Affinity Partners manages from foreign sources.

Kushner founded Affinity in July 2021, less than six months after leaving the White House as a senior adviser to former President Donald Trump. The company quickly attracted major Middle Eastern investors, receiving $2 billion from the Saudi Public Investment Fund within weeks. Affinity continues to receive the vast majority of its funding from the Saudi Arabian government.

“It is deeply troubling that multiple Middle Eastern governments are using funds managed by Affinity to pay tens of millions of dollars in fees each year to former President Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, creating significant conflicts of interest and potential counterintelligence risks,” Wyden wrote Wednesday to Lauren Key, chief financial officer of Affinity Partners.

Affinity has told regulators that 99 percent of the $3 billion in assets the firm manages come from non-U.S. citizens. The $1 billion not funded by Saudi Arabia is reportedly split between UAE and Qatari sovereign wealth funds, Taiwanese billionaire politician Terry Gou and another investor whose identity has not yet been publicly disclosed.

On Wednesday, Wyden expressed concern that Kushner and others were using Affinity’s foreign-funded private investment funds as a loophole, exploiting those accounts to circumvent federal laws requiring Americans to disclose payments from foreign governments.

He estimated that Affinity receives at least $60 million annually in management fees from its exclusively foreign investor base and that the Saudi PIF alone paid the company at least $80 million in management fees from 2022 to 2023.

“As the founder and sole owner of Affinity, Kushner is the largest beneficiary of the fees paid to Affinity by the Saudi PIF and other Gulf state clients,” Wyden wrote.

Newsweek Affinity Partners has asked for comment via a request form.

During his time in the White House, Kushner advised his father-in-law on foreign policy issues and argued that the Trump administration should embrace Saudi Arabia. A staunch defender of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Kushner remained close to the royal even after U.S. authorities discovered that he had orchestrated the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

“The Saudi PIF’s decision to invest $2 billion in Affinity so soon after Kushner’s departure from the Trump White House raises concerns that the investment was a reward for official actions by Kushner that benefited the Saudi government, including preventing the Saudi government from being held accountable for ordering the brutal murder of journalist and American citizen Jamal Khashoggi,” Wyden said.

He continued: “In addition, Mr. Kushner reportedly traveled to Saudi Arabia on an official mission in the final two weeks of the Trump administration – even though the impending inauguration of a new president would have closed any reasonable window of opportunity for meaningful foreign policy achievements.”

Wyden expressed concern that Kushner’s “limited track record as an investor, including his lack of experience with private equity or hedge funds, raises questions about the investment strategy behind the seed investments and the lucrative compensation Affinity received from the Saudi PIF and other sovereign wealth funds.”

The Oregon Democrat demanded that Affinity release documents and information about the tens of millions of dollars in payments the company receives from abroad each year. He asked the company to provide answers by June 26 at the latest.