Donald Trump Meeting
Suggests He Is Keeping Up His
Business Ties
WASHINGTON President-elect Donald J. Trump met in the last week in his
office at Trump Tower with three Indian business partners who are building
a Trump-branded luxury apartment complex south of Mumbai, raising new
questions about how he will separate his business dealings from the work of the
government once he is in the White House.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Trump described the meeting as a courtesy call by the
three Indian real estate executives, who flew from India to congratulate Mr. Trump
on his election victory. In a picture posted on Twitter, all four men are smiling and
giving a thumbs-up.
It was not a formal meeting of any kind, Breanna Butler, a spokeswoman for the
Trump Organization, said when asked about the meeting on Saturday.
One of the businessmen, Sagar Chordia, posted photographs on Facebook on
Wednesday showing that he also met with Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump. Mr.
Trumps children are helping to run his businesses as they play a part in the
presidential transition.
Ms. Butler and Hope Hicks, a spokeswoman for Mr. Trump, declined to comment
when asked on Saturday if the meeting with the Trump family members included
any discussion of Trump businesses in India or expanding that business.
The three Indian executives Sagar Chordia, Atul Chordia, and Kalpesh
Mehta have been quoted in Indian newspapers, including The Economic Times,
as saying they have discussed expanding their partnership with the Trump
Organization now that Mr. Trump is president-elect.
Sagar Chordia did not respond to a request for a telephone interview. But in a
series of text messages with The New York Times early Sunday, he confirmed that
the meeting with Mr. Trump and members of his family had taken place, and that
an article written about it in the Indian newspaper, which reported that one of his
partners said they had discussed the desire to expand the deals with the Trump
family, was accurate.
Washington ethics lawyers said that a meeting with Indian real estate partners,
regardless of what was discussed, raised conflict of interest questions for Mr.
Trump, who could be perceived as using the presidency to advance his business
interests.
There may be people for whom this looks O.K., said Robert L. Walker, the former
chief counsel of the Senate Ethics Committee, who advises corporations and
members of Congress on government ethics issues. But for a large part of the
American public, it is not going to be O.K. His role as president-elect should dictate
that someone else handles business matters.
In an account of the meeting that appeared in The Economic Times, Mr. Trump
was quoted as praising the United States relationship with India and its prime
minister, Narendra Modi.
The Economic Times reported that the meeting occurred on Tuesday. A
spokeswoman for the Trump Organization would not confirm the day of the
meeting.
Internationally, many properties that bear Mr. Trumps name are the result of
marketing deals like the one in India in which he is paid by someone for the
use of his name but does not actually own the underlying property. He has such
marketing agreements in South Korea, the United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, the
Philippines and Turkey, according to a list published by his company.
Atul Chordia and Sagar Chordia are well-known figures in real estate in Pune, a city
of about three million people in the western Indian state of Maharashtra. Their
father, Ishwardas Chordia, was born into a family of sugar traders, but as a young
man forged a close friendship with Sharad Pawar, who became an important
politician in Maharashtra and now sits in the upper house of Indias Parliament.
Beginning in the 1990s, Chordia businesses built luxury hotels, corporate parks and
residential projects in upscale neighborhoods in Pune.
The third executive at the meeting, Mr. Mehta, is the managing partner of a realestate firm named Tribeca, which is also a part of the Trump projects in India,
which go by names including Trump Towers Pune and Trump Towers Mumbai.
Dave Besseling, a former deputy editor at GQ India, hosted an event at Sagar
Chordias hotel during the 2016 presidential campaign and said Mr. Chordia
expressed elation about Mr. Trumps candidacy and the opportunities it would
bring.
The same week, Mr. Trumps daughter Ivanka an executive at the Trump
Organization hotel chain attended a meeting with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of
Japan. The move drew criticism from former State Department officials, given that
Ms. Trump does not have security clearance and is helping run the family business
enterprises.
Separately, The Washington Post reported on Saturday that the recently opened
Trump International Hotel in Washington invited representatives from local
embassies to the hotel after the election to encourage them to use it when leaders
from their countries visited Washington.
Noah Bookbinder, the executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, a
liberal government watchdog group in Washington, said the meeting at Trump
Tower was inappropriate even if there had not been conversation about business.
Donald Trumps children and son-in-law have been deeply involved in the
transition and selecting who will be part of his administration, Mr. Bookbinder
said. At the same time they are deeply involved in the business. There does not
seem to be any sign of a meaningful separation of Trump government operations
and his business operations.
Ms. Butler, the spokeswoman for the Trump Organization, said the family was
moving to try to formally separate Mr. Trump from his familys business ventures.
Mr. Trump is not going to have dealings in the day-to-day business of that
organization, she said.
Another spokeswoman for the Trump Organization added in a written statement
that the structure that is ultimately selected will comply with all applicable rules
and regulations.
Asked if such a separation had already taken place in the aftermath of the election,
she said she did not know.
