Trump Will Host Next G7 Summit at His Doral Resort - The New York Times
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/17/us/politics/trump-g7-doral.html
WASHINGTON — President Trump has decided to host the Group of 7 meeting next June at the Trump National Doral near Miami, Mick Mulvaney, the president’s acting chief of staff, said Thursday, a decision that prompted immediate questions about whether it was a conflict of interest for him to choose one of his own properties for a diplomatic event.
Mr. Mulvaney said the president had considered the possibility of the “political sort of criticism” in picking the resort. But he said Mr. Trump chose it anyway because administration officials had considered hotels throughout the country, and concluded that the Trump National Doral was “by far and away, far and away, the best physical facility for this meeting.”
“‘It’s almost like they built this facility to host this type of event,’” Mr. Mulvaney told reporters, quoting what he said an unnamed official told him during the planning process. And he dismissed any suggestion that the president would profit from the choice.
Mr. Mulvaney said the hotel would put on the summit “at cost.” “I think the president has pretty much made it very clear since he got here that he doesn’t profit from being here,” he said. “He has no interest in profit from being here.”
“The Constitution is clear,” Ms. Pelosi wrote on Twitter, citing the emoluments clause. “The President cannot accept gifts or payments from foreign governments. No one is above the law.”
Legal experts said hosting the Group of 7 summit at the Doral might violate the Constitution in two ways.
First, the Constitution prohibits the president from accepting a gift or payment from a foreign government source, technically called a foreign emolument. And second, the president is prohibited from taking any kind of payment from the federal government that is beyond his salary.