Doing Business and Maintaining Your Integrity

I was in materials and logistics all of my life. I was working as management for various companies globally. Always traveling internationally and being gone for weeks at a time. While traveling and visiting company plants or various suppliers over sea’s, it was not unusual to be offered gifts.

The problem with such is you make a commitment once you accept a gift. Most people are honest and would not use such against you. Maybe you have to part ways at some time in the future and then, it may come up. Or maybe you have issues with the product coming from a supplier. What happens then?

One suggestion from a boss of mine. If it is edible and reasonable, you are probably safe. Don’t engage in gifts or trips, etc. Here we have our president shmoozing with a leader of a foreign company. We all know of Trump’s behavior. It does make Americans look bad and open to be bought. I subscribe to Kareem Takes on the News.”

Trump is a prime example of what not to do in representing the United States and selling a portion of his company.

“Kareem Takes on the News” ‘Spy Sheikh’ Bought Secret Stake in Trump Company, “Wall Street Journal

Summary: 

Four days before Donald Trump’s inauguration in January 2025, an Abu Dhabi royal signed a deal to purchase a 49% stake in the Trump family’s cryptocurrency venture for $500 million. The deal with World Liberty Financial was signed by Eric Trump and backed by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE’s national security adviser known as the “spy sheikh.” Under the agreement, $187 million was directed to Trump family entities, with at least $31 million going to entities affiliated with Steve Witkoff, Trump’s Middle East envoy. The investment marked the first time a foreign government official took a major ownership stake in an incoming U.S. president’s company. Months after the deal, the Trump administration approved the sale of advanced U.S. AI chips to the UAE—technology the Biden administration had restricted due to national security concerns. Sheikh Tahnoon, who oversees a $1.3 trillion investment empire, had been seeking access to these chips for his AI firm G42.

My Take:

When the White House explained that Donald Trump’s assets were placed in a trust run by his children, supposedly eliminating any conflict of interest, it reminded me of something I’ve seen too often in life: people using technicalities to dodge accountability. Since when do we have no interest in our children, of all people? Calling that arrangement a “blind trust” is like saying you’re practicing self‑discipline while eating a whole cheesecake because at least you’re not also eating that gallon of chocolate chip ice cream. Call it whatever you want, but everyone watching knows what’s going on.

Things get even harder to ignore when you look at the details. Eric Trump signed contracts worth $187 million. These weren’t random business deals. They involved foreign officials, people who rarely do anything without expecting something in return. And why didn’t they sign contracts with Eric during President Biden’s time in the office? Did they suddenly find a value in Eric that wasn’t quite as obvious when someone else’s father was president? Instead of a clean break between public service and private profit, it looks just like a family business operating out of the most powerful office in the world.

And as for the timing, that’s where the story starts to feel familiar to anyone who’s ever watched a game where the rules suddenly get “interpreted” differently depending on who benefits. These deals happened in a four‑day window after the election but before the inauguration. A strange no‑man’s‑land where campaign finance rules no longer applied and presidential ethics rules hadn’t kicked in yet. If everything was above board, why not wait until after the inauguration and do it in the open? When people hide things, it’s usually because they know how those things (or in this case, these millions of things) look.

Then came the policy shift. Months after a $500 million investment involving a foreign official, the administration approved the sale of advanced AI chips to the UAE, technology previously denied over national security concerns. You don’t need to be a detective to see why people are uneasy. Corruption rarely walks into the room wearing a name tag. But again I wouldn’t pass it by Trump to walk up to a lectern in a designer suit with CORRUPTION written all over it, brag about it, then try to explain away his version of corruption as a positive. After all, if Gordon Gecko could get away with saying “Greed is good,” contrary to nearly all religious morals and ethics, then the elder Trump can certainly give it his best shot.

Public trust is already fragile, down to about 16%. And trust, once broken, is hard to rebuild. It wasn’t always like this. There was a time when leaders tried to avoid even the appearance of impropriety. Many presidents put their assets and investments into a blind trust just to make sure no one could accuse them of mixing personal gain with public duty. That wasn’t about legality. It was about respect for the people they served.

Today, the bar has dropped way down, like a limbo game gone wrong. As long as something is “technically legal,” many shrug and move on. But legality isn’t the same as ethics. When spokespeople insist Trump “had no involvement” even though his son signed the contracts and the family earned millions, it creates a fog of confusion. And confusion is a strategy. If you throw enough fog at the public, eventually people get tired of squinting and give up.

That’s dangerous. Every time something like this happens without consequences, it quietly resets what future leaders think they can get away with. And trust me, foreign governments notice. What was unthinkable a generation ago starts to feel normal.

So the real question isn’t whether this particular deal was technically legal. The deeper question is whether we still expect leaders to put the public interest ahead of their own.

Leadership isn’t about perfection. It’s about accountability. And accountability starts with drawing a clear line between serving yourself and serving the people who put their trust in you. Clearly and without a doubt, Trump is serving his personal interests. And we the people need to start keeping score.