Kushner Didn’t Disclose Running Foundation That Funded Settlement Projects
Jared Kushner Image by Getty Images
(JTA) — Jared Kushner did not disclose on government filings his position as a director of a family foundation that funded projects in West Bank settlements.
Kushner’s position as co-director of the Charles and Seryl Kushner Foundation from 2006 to 2015, when the foundation donated at least $38,000 to the building of a Jewish seminary in the West Bank settlement of Beit El and an additional $20,000 to Jewish and educational institutions in other settlements, was not disclosed on his filings with the Office of Government Ethics, Newsweek reported Sunday.
The settlements are considered illegal under international law.
The revelation comes two days after reports that Kushner, President Trump’s Jewish son-in-law and a White House senior adviser, attempted to stop a vote on an anti-settlement resolution that passed during the Trump transition period.
Kushner has amended his financial records several times since his first filing with the government ethics office in March, and also has made three revisions to his security clearance application.
Newsweek reported that Kushner’s omission was first discovered by a team of researchers at American Bridge, a progressive research and communications organization. The group shared the discovery with Newsweek on Friday afternoon and its researchers suggested Kushner’s failure to disclose his position may have been an attempt to avoid “potential conflicts with his job negotiating Middle East peace.”
Had Kushner disclosed his position in the family foundation in his financial records, his involvement in the settlement donations and potential conflicts of interest with his government position may have been considered by the Office of Government Ethics, according to Newsweek.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
