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# The Trump Connection in LA’s Backyard
May 29 2017
Written by Andrea Bernstein & Ilya Marritz.
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TRUMP, KUSHNER AND LA’S VERY OWN CIM---The Watchtower in Brooklyn Heights is one of the most noticeable edifices in New York. It’s a complex of buildings on a bluff above the East River, with a sign on top that flashes the time and temperature. It used to be the world headquarters of the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
But today, workers are preparing to give it a makeover. Like so much else in Brooklyn, the Watchtower has been sold to developers. It changed hands last August, shortly after Donald Trump accepted the Republican nomination for President.
The timing is relevant, because the buyer was Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. At $340 million, Kushner’s purchase of the Watchtower was one of the biggest real estate transactions in Brooklyn history.
Kushner didn’t buy the Watchtower alone. He had help from a company called CIM Group, a [private equity firm based in Los Angeles](http://www.cimgroup.com/). Over the years, documents show, CIM has done at least seven real estate deals that have benefited Trump and the people around him, including Kushner. Those deals included stabilizing the scandal-plagued Trump SoHo hotel, a key Manhattan holding for Trump and his children Ivanka, Eric, and Donald Jr.
At the same time, records show, CIM Group, with approximately $19.7 billion under management, has pursued an array of lucrative government contracts, pension investments, lobbying interests, and a global infrastructure fund, all of whose fortunes could benefit from a Trump presidency. [(Read the rest.)](http://www.wnyc.org/story/trump-kushner-little-known-business-partner/)
-cw
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