At least one Senate Republican is calling for an investigation of wedding after-party celebrations for President Donald Trump’s eldest son, which were financed by a Russian businessman with ties to the Kremlin.
The topic created waves on Capitol Hill on Tuesday thanks to a letter sent by Sen. John Curtis, R-Utah, to Senate Judiciary Committee leaders urging a probe, though other GOP senators didn’t go as far.
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., a Judiciary Committee member, said he had not seen the letter but wouldn’t be opposed to the idea if Chairman Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa, supported it.
“It is up to the chair. I would not oppose it,” Tillis said of an investigation.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters, “That’s a decision that Chairman Grassley would have to make” and that he doesn’t have “enough information about it.”
The multiday celebrations in the Bahamas for Donald Trump Jr., reported by ProPublica to have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, were paid for by Umar Kremlev, president of the International Boxing Association.
“It’s totally allowed. A lot of people have parties. It’s totally allowed,” the president, when pressed on the issue last week, said from the Oval Office. “I hear he paid him back. A person he knows, I guess a friend of his, gave him a wedding party.”
“That’s very common. I’ve heard of many people giving wedding parties. … I don’t know, maybe he didn’t do a background check. But I’ve given wedding parties to numerous people,” Trump continued, saying Don Jr. told him, “I’m paying him back, dad.”
Curtis this week sent the letter to Grassley and Judiciary ranking member Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., calling on the panel to open an investigation into “the use of presidential family relationships for private financial benefit, preferential treatment, or access by domestic and foreign interests” and to subpoena Don Jr. as well as Hunter Biden.
“For years, serious questions have been raised about members of presidential families using their names and proximity to the President to advance private business interests,” Curtis wrote. “Americans deserve confidence that public institutions serve them — not presidents, political parties, wealthy interests, or members of powerful families. Congress has an obligation to pursue credible concerns wherever they lead and without regard to party.”
In the letter, Curtis said the son of former President Joe Biden “conducted substantial business with foreign entities, including interests in China and Ukraine, while his father held or sought public office” and that while Hunter denied involving his father in his business dealings, “there is little question that President Biden’s decades in public office gave his son a degree of access, name recognition, and influence that materially enhanced his value in business dealings and opened doors that otherwise may have remained closed.”
Curtis wrote the concerns surrounding the Trump family are “compounded” by “active promotion of family-backed cryptocurrency ventures” and more.
“The country should not have to accept one standard for the family of a Republican president and another for the family of a Democratic president. Nor should congressional oversight begin and end when control of the White House changes hands,” he wrote.
Durbin responded to Curtis’ letter with a statement saying “corruption at the highest levels of our government should never be tolerated” and that “for the Committee to ignore this matter is to run the risk of being complicit in a coverup. I will join in supporting Senator Curtis’ request of the Senate Judiciary Committee.”
“Senator Curtis has made a good faith request that the Senate Judiciary Committee investigate the lavish gift of a Russian oligarch to President Trump’s son as well as any wrongdoing by the son of former President Biden,” Durbin said. “In fairness, Hunter Biden has already given a sworn deposition to Congress on this issue of corrupt activity. Donald Trump Jr. has not.”
Grassley’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Some Senate Republicans scoffed at Curtis’ idea. “I couldn’t care less who throws a private citizen a wedding after-party. Subpoenas of presidential family members must pass a high bar,” Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, wrote on the social platform X.
But several Democrats on the committee said they welcomed the call.
“We have a real duty to investigate all of this just absolutely blatant corruption that’s so dangerous to our national security, like the Trump Jr. wedding gift. We’ve never seen anything like the crypto corruption, with foreign governments literally stashing the president’s pockets with cash,” said Judiciary member Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.
As the midterm elections approach in November, Blumenthal said he believes voters are paying attention. “The point is the corruption is underlying a lot of the anger about affordability, because it’s not just that prices are rising; it’s that Trump and his family are self-enriching in a way that is truly unprecedented.”
Two other Democrats on the committee, Sens. Alex Padilla of California and Cory Booker of New Jersey, said they had yet to see Curtis’ letter but supported the idea of a hearing.
“I’ve been calling for that for some time, so I’m really hoping that we have a hearing,” Booker said. “There’s been no accountability, and this is so outrageous, so beyond the pale. I’m so grateful for Curtis’ courage and standing up for what is obviously right, and doing our constitutional job of checks and balances.”
Hunter Biden, whose business dealings received significant scrutiny from Republicans during his father’s administration, said on X to “bring it on.”
“I’ve already given more than seven hours of sworn testimony. More than three dozen witnesses testified across two chambers,” Biden posted. “I had no foreign business dealings while my father was president.”
On X, Curtis wrote, “Republicans nearly wore out the subpoena machine investigating Hunter Biden’s foreign relationships. We should not unplug it now. ‘Trust us’ was not enough then, and it is not enough now.”
A “toaster is a wedding gift. A private-island party paid for by a Putin-connected oligarch is something else,” he added.
Jacob Fulton contributed to this report.
