profit

NEW YORK — For decades, presidents avoided even the appearance of profiting from their office.

Harry Truman refused to lend his name to any business, even in retirement. Richard Nixon so feared a brother might profit off their ties, he had his phone tapped. And George W. Bush dumped his individual stock holdings before taking office.

President Trump is taking a different approach.

The family real estate business is undergoing the fastest overseas expansion since its founding a century ago, each deal potentially shaping everything including tariffs and military aid.

Led by Eric Trump and his brother, Donald Jr., the family business has expanded into cryptocurrencies with ventures that brought in billions of dollars but raised questions about whether some big investors received favorable treatment in return.

The brothers have also joined or invested in a number of companies that aim to do business with the government their father runs. Last month, they struck a deal giving them stakes worth millions in an armed drone maker seeking contracts with the Pentagon and with gulf states under attack by Iran and dependent on the U.S. military led by their father.

The White House and the Trump Organization deny there are any ethical problems. Asked about the issue at a recent crypto conference, Donald Jr. said, “Frankly, it’s gotten old.”

The problem of conflicts of interest goes back a decade to when Trump first ran for office, but some government ethics experts and historians argue it’s more pressing than ever as conflicts pile up in his second term that they consider unprecedented, blatant and dangerous to democracy.

“I don’t think there’s any line right now between policy decisions and political calculations and the interest of the Trump family,” said Julian Zelizer, a presidential historian at Princeton University.

Deal-making spree abroad

In Trump’s first term, the Trump Organization did zero deals in foreign countries. In a little over a year into his second term it did eight, all ostensibly complying with the Trump Organization’s self-imposed rule not to do business directly with foreign governments.

But governments in authoritarian and one-party states rarely take a hands-off approach — especially when the business belongs to a sitting president.

In Qatar, a Trump golf club and villa project is being developed in part by a company owned by the Qatari government. In Vietnam, where The New York Times reported the government pushed farmers off their land to make way for a Trump resort, the country’s deputy prime minister signed off on the deal at a ceremony. And in Saudi Arabia, a planned “Trump Plaza” resort on the Red Sea is being built by a Saudi real estate developer close to the ruling family.

Whether the deals played any role in changing U.S. policies in ways these countries sought is nearly impossible to know, but the countries did get what they wanted — access to advanced U.S. technology for Qatar, tariff relief for Vietnam and fighter jets for Saudi Arabia.

And the Trump Organization got something too: tens of millions in fees.

Asked about those projects, the Trump Organization said it has done no deals with governments so far, noting that the Saudi company was private, and has said it is “collaborating” with the Qatari business and had not struck a “partnership” with it that would have broken its self-imposed rules.

The UAE, crypto and Binance

Another deal raising conflicts of interest questions first came to light in a Wall Street Journal article in January — a year after it was struck.

Days before the inauguration, the Trump family sold nearly half of its World Liberty Financial crypto business to a UAE government-linked company run by a member of the UAE royal family for $500 million.

A second UAE entity, a government fund, invested in the offshore cryptocurrency exchange Binance using $2 billion worth of a digital currency called a stablecoin issued by World Liberty. That allowed the Trump company that received the dollars to put it in safe investments such as bonds or money market funds and keep the tens of millions of dollars in interest for itself.

Shortly after, the Trump administration reversed a Biden-era restriction and granted the UAE access to advanced U.S. chips. Binance’s founder, Changpeng Zhao, later got a pardon from Trump, despite having pleaded guilty to failing to stop criminals from using his platform to move money connected to child sex abuse, drug trafficking and terrorism.

A lawyer for Zhao denied any connection between Binance’s business with the Trump family and the pardon.

“Any claim of a quid pro quo by Binance or CZ, or preferential financial treatment by Binance, is a clear misstatement of the public record,” said Teresa Goody Guillen in a email to the AP, referring to Zhao by his initials.

Asked about the pardon, the White House said federal authorities had unfairly punished Zhao in what it called “The Biden Administration’s war on crypto.”

World Liberty dismissed the notion of a conflict, saying the UAE deal had no connection to the president’s chips policy.

Crypto billions

World Liberty has also provided a separate income stream to a new Trump limited liability corporation through sales of “governance tokens” that give owners certain voting rights in its business, though not equity stakes, raising $2 billion last year. That translates into hundreds of millions of dollars for the Trumps through their World Liberty ownership stake and a separate side deal allowing them a cut of these sales.

One big token investor was Justin Sun, a cryptocurrency billionaire who as a foreign citizen would be banned under U.S. law from making political donations to U.S. politicians. Between Trump’s election and inauguration, Sun spent $75 million on the tokens.

In February last year, a federal lawsuit charging Sun with duping investors was paused before being settled last month for a $10-million fine.

Then there are the souvenir-type “meme” coins stamped with Trump’s face that went on sale days before he took the oath of office last year.

Over the next four months, the coins generated $320 million, mostly going to Trump-related entities, according to blockchain tracker Chainalysis. That is more than double the money collected in four years running his Washington hotel in Trump’s first term.

Unlike the lobbyists or campaign donors trying to influence Trump, the coin buyers can buy anonymously. One who chose to make his purchase public was Sun, who spent $200 million on the coins and got access to Trump at a gala party he held for the biggest buyers.

Another family cryptocurrency business, American Bitcoin, went public in September, giving Donald Jr. and Eric about $1 billion in paper wealth at that time. Months earlier, their father announced a new national bitcoin reserve, sending the price for the cryptocurrency soaring to a record.

The Trump businesses aren’t completely immune to crypto’s notorious volatility. The value of bitcoin and other digital tokens has since plunged and rattled investors. Both American Bitcoin stock and the value of Trump’s souvenir meme coins have collapsed 90% from their highs.

Last month, Trump announced he would hold another dinner with new top holders of his meme coins, giving the coin a boost before it fell back again.

“Whatever constraints there were in the first term appear to have completely disappeared,” says Columbia University historian Timothy Naftali. “Do you want future presidents to be open to the highest bidder?”

Trump thinks people don’t care

Asked to comment for this story, the White House said Trump acts in an “ethically-sound manner” and that any suggestion to the contrary is either “ill-informed or malicious.” It reiterated that his assets are in a trust managed by his children and stated he has “no involvement” in family business deals.

“There are no conflicts of interest,” said spokesperson Anna Kelly.

In a separate statement, the Trump Organization said it is “fully compliant with all applicable ethics and conflicts of interest laws” and added, “The implication that politics has enriched the Trump family is unfounded.”

Trump in January told the New York Times that when it comes to potential conflicts of interest, “I found out that nobody cared, and I’m allowed to,” alluding to an exemption the president gets from the federal statute banning federal officials from holding financial interests in businesses impacted by public policy they help shape.

It’s not clear he’s wrong about American attitudes, though they appear to be changing even among Republicans. In a Pew Research Center poll in January, 42% of those voters said they were confident that Trump acts ethically in office, down from 55% at the start of his second term a year ago.

Change of fortune

Forbes estimates Trump’s net worth is now $6.3 billion, soaring 60% from before he returned to office, a striking development given how much the Trump Organization struggled before.

The Trump International Hotel in D.C. never turned a profit before being sold. Two Trump hotel chains catering to middle-class travelers in his first term shut down for lack of demand. Condominium buildings stripped the Trump name off their facades after discovering that instead of attracting buyers, it was repelling them.

No new U.S. condominiums are putting the Trump name above their entrances in his second term, but his name is prized in Washington, where people have business before the federal government.

Donald Jr., Trump’s oldest son, opened a private club in the Georgetown section of Washington that is charging initiation fees as high as $500,000 for founding members.

One of the few clubs with comparable fees, the Yellowstone Club in Montana, offers access to multiple resorts, 50 ski trails and more than a dozen restaurants across a members-only area the size of Manhattan.

Donald Jr.’s club is in the basement of a building but offers something else — proximity to power.

The club’s name is “Executive Branch.”

Bibles, guitars and sneakers

Other presidents and their families have done things in pursuit of profit that stained that high office.

Hunter Biden got paid as a director of a Ukrainian gas company while his father was vice president. The Clinton Foundation got foreign donations, though after Bill Clinton had left office. And Jimmy Carter’s brother Billy cashed in on the family name by selling beer.

In Trump’s case, the president himself is hawking goods, including $59.99 “God Bless the USA” Bibles, $399 sneakers stamped “Never Surrender” and electric guitars priced up to $11,500 — shipping not included — for a model autographed by the president.

New year, new profits

In the first months of Trump’s second year back in the White House, the momentum hasn’t let up.

In January, the Trump Organization announced its third deal involving Saudi Arabia in less than a year, this time a “collaboration” with a company more directly tied to the government because it is owned by the country’s sovereign wealth fund chaired by its crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman. Asked by the AP whether the project outside Riyadh for Trump mansions, a hotel and golf course violated the company’s pledge not to strike deals with foreign governments, the Trump Organization said it doesn’t “conduct business with any government entity” but didn’t address the project specifically.

Meanwhile, as the two oldest brothers’ new drone company seeks Pentagon contracts, other government contractors in which one or both have gotten ownership stakes this past year are taking in tens of millions of dollars of new taxpayer money. That includes a rocket motor maker, an AI chip supplier and a data analytics company, according to government contracting records.

Asked about potential conflicts after the drone deal was announced, Eric said, “I am incredibly proud to invest in companies I believe in.” A spokesman for Donald Jr. said he doesn’t “interface” with the government on companies in his portfolio, adding that “the idea that he should cease living his life and making a living to provide for his five kids just because his dad is president, is quite frankly, a laughable and ridiculous standard.”

A new investment firm that the brothers joined as advisors last year has raised $345 million in an initial public offering to buy stakes in U.S. companies designed to help their father revive America’s manufacturing base. After the AP asked Trump’s chief business lawyer about language in a regulatory filing stating the firm would target companies seeking federal grants, tax credits and government contracts, he filed a new document with that language removed.

Zelizer, the Princeton historian, says he expects future presidents will show more restraint in enriching themselves, but worries about the message Trump is sending.

“He has shown politically there is no price to be paid to making money,” he said. “You know you can go there.”

Condon writes for the Associated Press.

The greatest legacy from the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles continues to be the LA84 Foundation, which has invested more than $250 million supporting youth sports organizations in Southern California through cash grants. It was created by receiving $93 million in profits from the 1984 Olympic Games under the vision of lead organizer Peter Ueberroth.

On Thursday, the LA84 Foundation sponsored its eighth Play Equity Summit, which is designed to find solutions to the challenges of access to youth sports activities. The theme was, “Play Because it Matters.”

Renata Simril, CEO of the LA84 Foundation, said, “The most powerful stadiums in America are the school yard and the block on your street.”

LA84 Foundation CEO Renata Simile.

(Eric Sondheimer / Los Angeles Times)

She said youth sports at the grassroots level are failing. The pay-to-play model is rising, making youth sports a $40-billion industry while leaving many behind.

“The only P.E. that belongs in youth sports is play equity,” Simril said.

She told those attending, “The task is to act and think differently.”

She remembers learning tennis on her neighborhood street and “the cracked court” at Carson High.

Simril said with the World Cup, Super Bowl and Olympic Games coming to Los Angeles over the next two years, “We have a generational opportunity to align the biggest moment in sports.”

She wants others to create legacy programs that last for youth sports through “more partnerships, more sponsorships, more access.”

“Purpose and profit can grow higher,” she said. “It should grow. It can lead to a legacy of investment in young people forever.”

She made it clear why participation in sports is so important for boys and girls.

“Play is how they become ready for life,” she said.

This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.

Some employees called it the “dash for cash.”

Months after Kaiser Permanente doctors saw a patient, federal prosecutors said, administrators pushed the physicians to add new, false diagnoses to the medical record in a billion-dollar scheme to defraud the government. Kaiser in February paid $556 million to settle the allegations.

“Deliberately inflating diagnosis codes to boost profits is a serious violation of public trust,” said Scott Lambert, acting deputy inspector general for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Kaiser faced further scrutiny a month later when the nonprofit healthcare giant paid $30 million to settle another case brought by federal investigators, this one involving claims it had failed for years to provide patients with adequate access to mental health care.

Kaiser said it settled the fraud case without admitting wrongdoing. It said the mental health settlement did not involve its current practices.

Yet critics have pointed to the repeated legal payouts, saying they reflect how Kaiser has veered from its charitable mission in recent years and is now virtually indistinguishable from its for-profit competitors keenly focused on the bottom line.

That shift has also fueled recent tensions with its employees, who have complained about inadequate resources to address staffing shortages and patient delays.

“Their focus is on profit and in doing more with less,” said Kadi Gonzalez, a nurse who works in Kaiser’s obstetrics and gynecology clinic in Downey. Gonzalez was one of more than 30,000 nurses and other Kaiser professionals who walked out in a four-week strike that ended last month.

The unions said their strike was as much about staffing levels and patient safety as it was about wages.

“The more patients a nurse has, the higher the mortality rate,” Gonzalez said. “We don’t have enough providers.”

The Oakland-based giant insures almost 1 of every 4 Californians. It operates as both an insurer and a provider of care in a closed system that makes it difficult for patients to get treatment elsewhere.

Kaiser declined to make its executives available for comment, but issued a statement disputing the claims.

“Our charitable purpose guides every decision we make,” the statement said. “Driven by our mission, we offer better care and coverage to our members, invest billions of dollars in our communities every year, and work to advance high-quality, affordable, equitable, evidence-based care in communities across the country.”

The statement added that its hospitals are “among the best staffed in California” and that staffing levels always meet or exceed state requirements.

A surge in profits

Founded in 1945, Kaiser has long gained national attention for its managed care model and focus on preventative care.

The nonprofit says its mission is “to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to improve the health of our members and the communities we serve.”

The Kaiser system — the largest healthcare nonprofit in the country — serves 9.5 million Californians. The Times offers Kaiser insurance to its employees.

Last year, Kaiser took in more than $127 billion in revenue, earning a profit of $9.3 billion. The net income was mainly from investments, with a smaller share ($1.4 billion) from its sprawling operations as well as insurance premiums.

Kaiser has continued to hike its insurance premiums faster than inflation.

In 2025, premiums increased an average of 5.1% in Southern California and 8.2% in Northern California, according to Beere & Purves, a general insurance agency. In January, it raised them by another 6.5% in Southern California and 7.1% in the northern part of the state.

Kaiser has been rapidly expanding nationwide. It now has hospitals and clinics in at least 10 states and the District of Columbia, some operating under a separate nonprofit that it created in 2023 called Risant Health.

Kaiser said in its statement that D.C.-based Risant “is a way for us to expand access to high-quality, affordable care to millions more people, in fulfillment of our mission.”

“As a nonprofit, any returns are reinvested back into patient care, infrastructure, workforce benefits, and community health programs—not distributed to shareholders,” it said.

Kaiser said that its annual premium increases were “generally lower” than its competitors.

The surge of money has increased Kaiser’s reserve of cash and investments, which reached $73 billion in 2025 — 68% higher than in 2019, according to its financial statements.

Because Kaiser is registered as a charity, it pays no taxes on its profits or its extensive real estate holdings. After a recent buying spree, the nonprofit system said it had 847 medical offices and 55 hospitals at the end of 2025.

The arm of Kaiser that operates its hospitals and clinics avoided $784 million in federal income tax, $372 million in state income tax and $204 million in property tax in 2024, according to an analysis by the Lown Institute, a healthcare think tank.

In all, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals received nearly $1.5 billion in tax and other benefits by registering as a charity, the institute calculated.

Laws exempt nonprofits from paying taxes with the assumption they will give back to the community.

In 2024, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals provided $963 million in patient financial assistance and contributions to community health programs, but that still fell short of its tax benefit by more than $500 million, according to the Lown Institute.

Dr. Vikas Saini, the institute’s president, said that amount of money could help solve a myriad of California’s social problems.

“If they closed that gap, what would that $500 million get you?” he asked.

In a 2024 study, the institute found that Kaiser had the largest gap between its tax benefits and charitable spending of any of the nation’s nonprofit hospital systems.

Kaiser said in its statement that its combined charitable spending was far more than the institute’s calculation for its hospital arm. It said it not only provided patients with financial assistance, but also spent money on affordable housing, food access, community health and disaster recovery — efforts that totaled $5.3 billion last year.

After the January 2025 wildfires, Kaiser said it provided 2,400 households with financial assistance, opened evacuation centers, deployed mobile health vehicles and provided mental health services to victims.

“We have never been prouder of how we are delivering on our mission for the public good,” the statement said.

As Kaiser has grown, so has compensation for its top executives, which is among the highest of all California nonprofits.

In 2024, Greg Adams, Kaiser’s chief executive, was paid nearly $13 million, according to its filings. At least 40 other executives received total compensation of more than $1 million that year.

The nonprofit has a board of directors of more than a dozen members, with all but a few receiving $250,000 or more a year, according to the filing.

The board helps to oversee Kaiser’s fast-growing operations as well as its $73-billion financial reserve, which healthcare advocates and experts have said is far higher than its competitors and the level the state requires.

“I’m flabbergasted,” Saini said when told of the reserve’s size. “Who decides how big of a reserve is enough?”

Kaiser said it maintained the large financial reserve “to ensure long-term stability, manage emergencies, support major capital investments, and support our people’s retirement benefits.”

And it said senior managers were paid less than most for-profit health plans.

Patients delays, staffing shortages

Some longtime Kaiser members have left for other insurers, citing a decline in care.

Mark Schubb, a Santa Monica resident, had been a Kaiser member since 1995. He said he left in 2022 after experiencing months-long delays to visit his primary care doctor and specialists.

When he complained, Schubb said, “the answer was, ‘Well, you can always go to urgent care.’ “

Gonzalez, the nurse in Downey, said patients often wait three months for an appointment. And when they finally get in, the 20-minute appointment may be double-booked, she said, leaving the physician assistant with 10 minutes to see them.

“They can wait months for an appointment and then they are rushed through,” she said. “Kaiser has the resources to fix these things.”

In one case, 53-year-old Francisco Delgadillo arrived at the Kaiser ER in Vallejo, Calif., in December 2023 with severe chest pain. After an initial assessment, he waited eight hours for care, according to state regulators.

He died in the lobby.

A state and federal investigation found multiple violations, including that Kaiser failed to have a licensed nurse monitoring the dozens of patients in the ER’s waiting room.

Kaiser didn’t respond to a request to comment on the death but has disputed claims of inadequate staffing at its hospitals.

Complaints about a lack of available mental health care go back more than a decade.

In 2023, Kaiser agreed to a $200-million settlement after the state found it had canceled tens of thousands of mental health appointments and failed to provide timely care. The settlement included a $50-million fine — the largest the state had ever levied against a health plan.

Garie Connell, a Kaiser therapist and licensed clinical social worker in Encino, said the system had been rationing mental health care for years, while earning big profits.

“They’ve really lost their way,” she said.

Kaiser said it had “made significant investments to expand choice and access to mental health care over the past several years.” The healthcare provider said it now has more than 35,000 employed and contracted clinicians delivering mental health and addiction care.

Unsupported diagnoses

Kaiser said that it settled the alleged $1-billion fraud case last month to avoid the “cost of prolonged litigation” and that the findings of federal investigators involved “a dispute regarding certain documentation practices.”

In their complaint, prosecutors alleged that Kaiser mined data to find possible diagnoses that could be added to patients’ records to make them look sicker than they were. The patients were in Kaiser’s Medicare Advantage plan, which received bigger government payments for patients with multiple ailments.

Doctors were praised and given gifts, including bottles of champagne, the complaint said, for agreeing to the administrators’ requests to add the diagnoses.

As one Kaiser slide in an internal training session explained, “Medicare Queries: Why Now?”

The slide then provided the answer: “Diagnoses = Revenue.”