Organizers on Sunday barred journalists from a publicly advertised event in Shanghai that offered Chinese investors the chance to get US immigrant visas if they put money in a real-estate project linked to the family of US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.
The two-tower luxury apartment complex in New Jersey, One Journal Square, is being developed by KABR Group and the Kushner Companies, which until recently was headed by senior White House adviser Jared Kushner, the husband of Trump’s daughter Ivanka.
The developers are seeking to raise US$150 million, or 15.4 percent of funding for the project, from investors through the EB-5 visa program, according to marketing materials posted by the event’s organizer, immigration agency Qiaowai (僑外移民).
Photo: AFP
The controversial EB-5 program allows wealthy foreigners to, in effect, buy US immigration visas for themselves and families by investing at least US$500,000 in certain development projects.
“Sorry, this is a private event,” said a man stopping journalists from entering a function room at the Four Seasons Hotel in Shanghai.
Guests at the event said Kushner’s sister, Nicole Kushner Meyer, spoke for about 10 minutes, including about her family’s humble roots.
According to the New York Times, Meyer attended a similar event in Beijing on Saturday and told the audience of about 100 people the project “means a lot to me and my entire family.”
Jared Kushner, whose White House portfolio includes relations with China, sold his stake in Kushner Companies to a family trust early this year.
“Mr Kushner has no involvement in the operation of Kushner Companies and divested his interests in the One Journal Square project by selling them to a family trust that he, his wife, and his children are not beneficiaries of, a mechanism suggested by the Office of Government Ethics,” his lawyer, Blake Roberts of WilmerHale law firm, said in a statement e-mailed to Reuters by the White House.
“As previously stated, he will recuse from particular matters concerning the EB-5 visa program,” it said.
A Kushner Companies spokeswoman declined to comment in a New York Times article about the Beijing event published on Saturday.
The Times story said Meyer did not respond when asked if she was concerned about possible conflicts of interest facing her brother. Journalists from the Times and the Washington Post were removed from Saturday’s Beijing event, the newspapers reported.
One potential investor, Sophie Xing, said a “very important” factor in her decision to attend Sunday’s event was the fact the project was a Kushner Companies investment and that Trump’s son-in-law’s sister would be in Shanghai.
“Actually I really don’t know how close they are, but I felt that this was a pretty good project,” she said.
In a promotional text message seen by Reuters, Qiaowai made note of Meyer’s relationship to Trump and called her the event’s “heavyweight honored guest.”
Qiaowai representatives at the event declined to answer questions from journalists and calls to its listed phone number went unanswered.
Qiaowai is also known as QWOS. Its promotional materials for the project, which it also calls Kushner1, advertise the prospect of putting money in under the federal EB-5 program.
The program is popular among wealthy Chinese looking to shift assets abroad or move overseas, but it has come under fire in the US.
Some US lawmakers have called for changing or abolishing the EB-5 program, but the scheme was recently renewed by Congress until Sept. 30.
Xing said a Kushner representative who spoke on Sunday stressed that EB-5 rules could change after September to raise the minimum required investment.
Another person who attended Sunday’s event, Liu Guoqi, was mindful of the potential rule change.
Liu said he had been to previous pitches for EB-5 investments, but had concerns about the risks.
“The whole thing may change later this year so we feel that there isn’t much time left,” he said.
In the US, the EB-5 program has also sparked concerns about possible scams. Some immigrants have been burned by misrepresentations made about the program by promoters, both inside and outside the US. Many have lost not only their money, but their chance at winning US citizenship.
Trump has vowed to clamp down on illegal immigration.
In addition to Beijing and Shanghai, the road show for One Journal Square was scheduled to visit the Chinese cities of Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Wuhan, according to Qiaowai’s marketing materials online.
It calls the Kushner family a “famous real estate clan” and touts EB-5 immigration as “peace of mind.”
Qiaowai’s Chinese-language marketing material describes the project as “supported by the government, created by a star developer,” and says the project is its 87th EB-5 program.
To many, Tatu City on the outskirts of Nairobi looks like a success. The first city entirely built by a private company to be operational in east Africa, with about 25,000 people living and working there, it accounts for about two-thirds of all foreign investment in Kenya. Its low-tax status has attracted more than 100 businesses including Heineken, coffee brand Dormans, and the biggest call-center and cold-chain transport firms in the region. However, to some local politicians, Tatu City has looked more like a target for extortion. A parade of governors have demanded land worth millions of dollars in exchange
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
An Indonesian animated movie is smashing regional box office records and could be set for wider success as it prepares to open beyond the Southeast Asian archipelago’s silver screens. Jumbo — a film based on the adventures of main character, Don, a large orphaned Indonesian boy facing bullying at school — last month became the highest-grossing Southeast Asian animated film, raking in more than US$8 million. Released at the end of March to coincide with the Eid holidays after the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan, the movie has hit 8 million ticket sales, the third-highest in Indonesian cinema history, Film
RSS