Buzzfeed has the receipts on Trump Tower Moscow

On Monday, [Trump's] lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said “the proposal was in the earliest stage,” and he went on to tell the New Yorker that “no plans were ever made. There were no drafts. Nothing in the file.”

However, hundreds of pages of business documents, emails, text messages, and architectural plans, obtained by BuzzFeed News over a year of reporting, tell a very different story. Trump Tower Moscow was a richly imagined vision of upscale splendor on the banks of the Moscow River.

Trump had for 30 years tried to extend his real estate empire to Moscow. He even wrote about it in his book The Art of the Deal. But he never found the right opportunity — until 2013, when he visited Russia to host the Miss Universe pageant. “TRUMP TOWER-MOSCOW is next,” he tweeted after the event.

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By September 2015, a New York architect had completed plans for a bold glass obelisk 100 stories high, to be topped by a gleaming, cut-diamond–like shape emblazoned on multiple sides with the Trump logo.

“The building design you sent over is very interesting,” the Russian real estate developer Andrey Rozov wrote to Cohen in September 2015, “and will be an architectural and luxury triumph. I believe the tallest building in Europe should be in Moscow, and I am prepared to build it.”

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According to a finalized letter of intent signed by Donald Trump on Oct. 28, 2015, the tower would have “approximately 250 first class, luxury residential condominiums.”

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The building would feature a luxury spa and fitness center, a commercial component “consistent with the overall luxury level of the Property,” and an office space “consistent with Class A luxury office properties,” as well as “luxury” parking.

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As with most of Trump’s other big real estate ventures, the plan was for a local developer — Rozov — to build Trump Tower Moscow. Trump’s team would provide the glittering name and would manage the building’s operations, such as restaurants and bars.

The Trump team would also have the option to “brand all or any portion of the spa or fitness facilities” as “The Spa By Ivanka Trump,” according to the plans.

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The top residence of the Moscow tower, enjoying a view without equal in all the continent, was to be a gleaming penthouse, the most luxurious property in a seriously luxurious building.

A show-stopping apartment like that could have been marketed for $50 million. But as BuzzFeed News reported in November, Trump’s fixers planned not to sell it — but to give it away for free, to none other than Vladimir Putin himself.

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The plans included detailed financial arrangements. According to the signed letter of intent, Trump’s company would get a $4 million up-front payment — a quarter when the licensing agreement was executed, another quarter when they finalized a location for the tower, and the other half either a week before the project’s groundbreaking or two years after the execution of the licensing agreement, whichever came first.

From there on out, Trump’s company would also get a cut of all the condominium sales at the tower, the agreement stated.

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The deal also stipulated how much Trump’s management company would get paid for running operations at Trump Tower Moscow over 25 years.

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Trump has many times denied having any business interests in Russia. But last year, BuzzFeed News revealed that negotiations over the tower lasted at least through June 2016, just a few weeks before Trump clinched the Republican nomination. The special counsel has since confirmed this fact, saying in a court filing that Cohen discussed the plan multiple times with the Trump Organization and asked Trump and a senior campaign staffer about traveling to Russia.

Last November, Cohen pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about when the deal ended.

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Giuliani has since acknowledged the plan went on longer than previously stated. “It’s our understanding that it — that they went on throughout 2016,” Giuliani told CNN. “Weren’t a lot of them, but there were conversations. Can’t be sure of the exact date. But the president can remember having conversations with him about it.”

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He has since backtracked, stating that his comments on Trump Tower Moscow were “hypothetical and not based on conversations I had with the president.”

  Buzzfeed

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.






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