Officials in Vietnam are under pressure to reach a trade deal with Trump. They’re also scrambling to approve projects sought by Trump’s family business.
Fearing tariffs, one country reportedly ‘ignored its own laws’ to back a Trump Org project - MSNBC
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— (@oc88.bsky.social) 2025-05-28T19:18:22.884Z
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/fearing-tariffs-one-country-reportedly-ignored-laws-back-trump-org-pro-rcna209485
In mid-April, as much of the world struggled to come to terms with Donald Trump’s trade war, The Wall Street Journal reported on a variety of strategies that countries were exploring to stave off the president’s tariffs. The article noted in passing that Vietnam, in particular, was so concerned about potential economic punishment that the country “accelerated the approvals for a $1.5 billion Trump resort.”
That one partial sentence in the sixth paragraph of a longer article stood out in large part because of its implications: If the Journal was correct, it suggested that at least some officials abroad were working from the assumption that the American president is corrupt and that doing favors for his family business would translate into favorable treatment from his administration.
A month later, The New York Times published a detailed examination of Vietnam’s efforts, which went further than the Journal’s report even suggested.
To fast-track the Trump development, Vietnam has ignored its own laws, legal experts said, granting concessions more generous than what even the most connected locals receive. Vietnamese officials, in a letter obtained by The New York Times, explicitly stated that the project required special support from the top ranks of the Vietnamese government because it was ‘receiving special attention from the Trump administration and President Donald Trump personally.’
...What’s more, there’s no reason to see Vietnam’s fast-track approval for the Trump Organization’s $1.5 billion golf community in isolation: Reuters reported last week on the American president’s family business and a local partner in Vietnam also “
exploring plans to build a skyscraper in Vietnam’s business hub of Ho Chi Minh City.” It led The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank to describe the developments as part of
“a transparent attempt to buy Trump’s favor while it tries to persuade him to drop tariffs he imposed against the country.”
Whether the White House will play its part in this scheme and show Vietnam favorable treatment remains to be seen. Watch this space.
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