NEW YORK — Donald Trump paid off his $100 million loan on Trump Tower that was coming due later this year and borrowed the same amount last month, public records show.
The new loan was made by San Diego-based Axos Bank. Gregory Garrabrants, the lender’s president and chief executive officer, is a Republican donor who gave more than $9,000 to Trump’s 2020 reelection effort, federal filings show.
Axos Bank declined to comment. The deal was reported earlier by Forbes and The Associated Press.
In September, the old loan had been moved to a watch list because of “lower average occupancy” at the midtown Manhattan building, according to information compiled by Wells Fargo & Co., the master servicer of the loan.
The $100 million loan was just one piece of more than $590 million of debt held by the Trump Organization coming due within the next few years. More than half of it is personally guaranteed by Trump.
The pandemic has weighed on Manhattan, sending office and retail vacancy rates soaring and weighing on rents. At Trump Tower, located on Fifth Avenue near Central Park, footwear maker Marc Fisher “vacated prior to lease end,” Wells Fargo said, adding that the Trump Organization is trying to find a replacement.
A year ago, Trump’s company sued Marc Fisher, which partnered with Ivanka Trump’s now-defunct fashion line, for more than $1 million in unpaid back rent. It later dropped the lawsuit, according to court records.
Garrabrants — the head of Axos, formerly Bank of Internet USA — has stood out for his immense pay. He made $34.5 million in 2018, more than Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase & Co., even though the lender had less than $10 billion in assets. Around that time, the firm was behind a sizable loan to the company owned by the family of Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, he told employees to get busy or face discipline.
Trump Tower, 10 stories shorter than the former U.S. president has claimed, has been home to gangsters, gamblers, politicos, celebrities and billionaires, including Michael Jackson, Paul Manafort and, in a marbled triplex penthouse, Trump himself.
Trump has a few other concerns besides the tower’s mortgage. His accounting firm severed ties, he has teased another run at the White House, and he and two of his children were ordered to testify in a fraud case.
