President Donald Trump is bracing for the possibility of Democrats launching investigations into members of his extended family in the event that they win back control of Congress in November’s midterms, according to a report.
The Daily Mail reports that the president is “angry” but “not surprised” at the prospect and is preparing to put aside millions of dollars from the $400 million raised by his MAGA Inc. super PAC should it be needed to bankroll their legal defenses. It’s money Republicans had hoped he might spend on campaigning for the midterms.
The newspaper suggests that even first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump, currently studying at New York University’s Stern School of Business on its campus in Washington, D.C., could be targets for Democratic lawmakers.
Trump was impeached by House Democrats twice in his first term – once for threatening to withhold congressionally-approved military aid from Ukraine unless President Volodymyr Zelensky announced an investigation into Joe Biden and once for stoking the January 6 Capitol riot – only to be acquitted by Senate Republicans in each instance.
This time, top Democrats have signaled that, should they win back the majorities, they would focus their attention on the Trump family allegedly using the presidency to enrich themselves.
Asked about their potential angle of approach by Politico in August, California Rep. Robert Garcia answered, “Ideally, it’s the president’s sons and the president and the family,” but also named other Trump advisers and Cabinet officials he would like to hear from, including Susie Wiles, Stephen Miller and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law.
In the same interview Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin said: “There’s enough Trump family corruption to go around. I don’t think we have to worry about that. We will just be dividing it up.”
“Leave no stone unturned,” a source from their party told the Mail. “No sacred cows for the most corrupt family in American history.”
While the family of the president was once considered off-limits, House Republicans’ pursuit of Hunter Biden in 2024 has set a clear precedent for investigating the commander-in-chief’s loved ones.
Arizona Democratic Rep. Yassamin Ansari last July expressed an interest in hearing Barron testify before Congress about his alleged contacts with Andrew Tate after he and his brother Tristan were arrested in Miami.
“Barron Trump is an adult,” she told Mediaite. “He is somebody who is deeply involved in Trump’s orbit and the whole manosphere, and he has a lot of influence. So he needs to be held accountable if he has committed any wrongdoing.”
The president’s youngest son was also a co-founder of the family’s cryptocurrency business, World Liberty Financial, along with his half-brothers Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, which has long been a source of concern to Democrats.
His mother Melania was meanwhile the subject of a letter sent by Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Georgia Rep. Hank Johnson to Amazon President and CEO Andy Jassy in March asking whether the company’s $40 million documentary about her was a “box office gamble or bribe.”
Should the first lady be compelled to appear before Congress, she would only be the fourth ever to do so and the first on a personal matter: Eleanor Roosevelt testified about migrant labor in 1940, Rosalynn Carter on mental health in 1979 and Hillary Clinton on healthcare reform in 1993.
Other areas of potential interest to Democrats might include Don Jr.’s recent Russian oligarch-funded wedding in the Bahamas, Kushner’s private equity venture receiving a $2 billion investment from a fund tied to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Kai Trump, the president’s teenage granddaughter, using the White House as a backdrop from which to model her clothing brand.
Responding, White House spokesperson Lauren Bis told The Independent: “Democrats targeted President Trump and his family with witch-hunts and hoxes for over a decade.
“President Trump only acts in the best interests of the American public – which is why they overwhelmingly re-elected him to this office, despite years of lies and false accusations against him and his businesses from the fake news media.
“While the president is focused on making Americans wealthier and safer than ever before, Democrats don’t stand for anything except for obstructing the administration’s commonsense agenda. The contrast speaks for itself.”
Recent polling gives Democrats a nine-point lead over Republicans ahead of the midterms, with a “bloodbath” predicted as a consequence of voter unhappiness with Trump’s stewardship of the economy and the Iran war.
Should they succeed in winning control of the House of Representatives and Senate, the president would find himself a lame duck, at risk of a historic third impeachment and with little hope of passing any of his preferred legislation in his twilight years in power.
