Eric Trump is reported to have remarked that his father’s golf courses were funded by Russia. He allegedly made this comment in 2014 during a conversation with golf writer Eric Dodson during which Donald Trump was also present. Dodson had been invited by one of Trump’s public relations people to a Trump golf property in Charlotte, North Carolina where Dodson expressed an interest in knowing how Trump was finding investors during a period where the economy was dead in the water, and golf construction money seemed to have dried up.
Trump’s reference to Russian money was recounted by Dodson to Boston public radio station WBUR-FM.
“He said, ‘Well, we don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.’ I said, ‘Really?’ And he said, ‘Oh, yeah. We’ve got some guys that really, really love golf, and they’re really invested in our programs. We just go there all the time.’ Now that was three years ago, so it was pretty interesting.”
Tactics believed to have been used by Russia to weaken Hilary Clinton’s campaign against Trump include the dissemination of false news, email hacking and cyber spying.Trump’s presidency remains under a cloud of suspicion regarding his ties to the Russian government as a result of accusations and alleged evidence that it played a hand in leveraging his White House victory, Dodson’s claims adding new kindling to an open fire.
Dodson, who considers himself a journalist, is said to only received a vague response from Trump that he had access to “100 million” after he attempted to investigate where he had managed to find money to finance his golf construction projects.
“Oh, yeah. We’ve got some guys that really, really love golf, and they’re really invested in our programs. We just go there all the time.” Eric is quoted as revealing later while he and Dodson crossed the in a golf cart.
Trump’s connection to the sport continues to fall under negative scrutiny of late. His Turnberry Golf Resort was supposed to have been the site of the British Open but was perceived to be potentially hazardous to advertisers concerned about remarks Trump has made about Muslims and Mexicans, among others, that seemingly cast a racist light over everything to do with his name.
Trump bought Turnberry in 2015 for approximately 63 million. It was, he thought, an ideal location to host the Open and was certain that it would bring justifiable returns on the investment. He’s also encountered trouble with one of his golf courses in Scotland where he has tried to stop the development of a wind farm being built near it. His complaint that the alternative energy project would obstruct the property’s view has been struck down twice, however, by the Scottish Supreme Court.