Wall St star approached to be Trump budget chief a year before loan to Kushner firm - Guardian

Wall St star approached to be Trump budget chief a year before loan to Kushner firm
Private equity executive Joshua Harris began financial disclosure process with support of Trump son-in-law before backing out, sources say. In 2017 his company loaned $184m to Kushner family business

Stephanie Kirchgaessner in New York

Mon 9 Apr 2018 15.00 AEST Last modified on Mon 9 Apr 2018 15.02 AEST

 Joshua Harris, co-founder and senior managing director of Apollo Global Management LLC.
 Joshua Harris, co-founder and senior managing director of Apollo Global Management LLC. Photograph: Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images
A senior private equity executive was approached about taking the job of US budget director a year before his company agreed to loan Jared Kushner’s private family business tens of millions of dollars, according to two sources who spoke to the Guardian.

Joshua Harris, the billionaire co-founder of Apollo Global Management, was considered to be a candidate for the job of director of Office of Management and Budget (OMB) shortly after Donald Trump won the 2016 election, according to the sources, who had knowledge of the situation and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

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The sources told the Guardian that Harris began the task of disclosing his financial holdings but then backed out of the potential job because it would have been too difficult to unravel his personal finances in the short amount of time required to accept the government position.

The sources said the alleged approach was initiated and backed by Kushner, a senior White House adviser who is also Trump’s son-in-law.

The circumstances surrounding the $184m loan by Apollo to Kushner Companies, Kushner’s private family business, is currently the subject of an internal inquiry by the White House counsel’s office after the 2017 loan was revealed in a New York Times report in February. The newspaper reported that Kushner and Harris had discussed a possible White House job but that the job never materialised.

Both Harris and an attorney representing Kushner emphatically deny that Harris was offered the OMB director job, which is one of the most powerful positions in any administration.

“Mr Harris never applied for, was offered, or accepted any position at OMB,” a spokesman for Harris told the Guardian.

The spokesman declined to comment on whether Harris had filled out financial disclosure forms. The spokesman did not dispute that a possible White House job had informally been discussed – as reported by the New York Times – but declined to offer any further details about the discussion.

A spokesman for Kushner’s private attorney, Abbe Lowell, also denied the account.

“Nothing about this assertion is accurate. Mr Kushner did not discuss any business concerning his former company in any meetings after he entered government, and he did not discuss the OMB or any position with him and did not (and could not) offer Josh Harris or anyone else the OMB position,” said the spokesman.

There is no evidence that Kushner ever personally discussed the Apollo loans with Harris or that he personally or formally offered Harris the OMB post. Neither Kushner nor Harris have been accused of wrongdoing.

But a source with direct knowledge, who said he was involved in the events, told the Guardian that Harris was offered the OMB job just days after the 2016 election and that the idea was initiated and supported by Kushner. The source said that Harris was “brilliant” and considered an innovative choice to lead the OMB because of Harris’s views about the federal deficit and corporate America. But that source said there was also some internal concern that Harris might be too close to Wall Street, since the administration already planned to tap Steve Mnuchin, a former banker, to serve as treasury secretary.

 Jared Kushner initiated and supported the idea of Joshua Harris becoming budget director, according to a source with direct knowledge.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest  Jared Kushner initiated and supported the idea of Joshua Harris becoming budget director, according to a source with direct knowledge.

The source with direct knowledge also alleged that Harris began filling out financial disclosure forms in connection to the position.

Another source, who worked on the Trump transition, was allegedly informed that Harris had been chosen for the OMB post by a senior administration official. The transition official was later informed that the job did not ultimately work out because the financial disclosure involved in working for the federal government was too complicated for Harris to sort out in the short period required.

The OMB directorship was later offered to Mick Mulvaney, a Republican hawk and former congressman, who accepted the job in mid-December 2016.

The New York Times reported in February that Harris started making regular visits to the White House in early 2017 and met Kushner on several occasions to discuss US infrastructure policy.

Months later, in November 2017, Apollo loaned $184m to Kushner Companies. The loan refinanced the company’s Chicago skyscraper.

The White House counsel’s office told David Apol, the acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, that it was investigating the facts surrounding the loan following the New York Times report, according to a letter Apol sent to a Democratic congressman on 22 March.

In a statement to the Guardian, the White House denied that Trump ever offered the OMB job to Harris.

The loan is drawing scrutiny on Capitol Hill.

White House investigating $500m loans to Kushner family firm – ethics chief

In a 20 March letter to Senator Elizabeth Warren and other members of Congress, which was provided to the Guardian by Apollo and written in response to the lawmakers’ questions, attorneys for Apollo at Williams & Connolly said that Kushner and Harris never discussed the Chicago loan and that initial discussions between Apollo and the Kushner Companies began in the summer of 2017, months after the alleged approach regarding the OMB job.

“To our knowledge, Jared Kushner did not play any role on behalf of Kushner Companies with respect to the Chicago loan,” the letter stated.

Apollo said the loan was made at market terms, in the ordinary course of business, and after an arm’s-length negotiation.

The letter – which did not make any reference to any alleged job discussions – also disclosed that Apollo had participated in one other loan to Kushner Companies. Apollo’s attorneys said that in the spring of 2017, Kushner Companies and RFR Holding LLC sought to buyout a real estate partner’s stake in properties in Brooklyn, New York. The buyout of the partner, Invesco Real Estate, involved a $425m loan, consisting of a $325m loan by Citigroup, and a $75m loan by Apollo, and a $10m loan by Rockwood Capital. Apollo said the loan was not unusual and that it was not discussed by Harris and Kushner