Last week, in what the White House billed as a major foreign-policy
speech, Donald Trump threatened to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal. He unveiled a new strategy that he said would curb Iran’s growing influence
in the Middle East. One part of his plan is to impose sanctions on the
Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. The Treasury Department is also
designating several ostensibly private Iranian companies (and one
Chinese firm) as aides in Tehran’s efforts to fund terrorism and build
weapons of mass destruction. But something important has been left
unsaid: the Trump Administration has not sanctioned an Iranian firm with
ties to both the Revolutionary Guard and to one of the Trump
Organization’s business partners.
In response to decades of U.S. and global sanctions, the Revolutionary
Guard has created hundreds of private companies that work as a loose
network, allowing the Revolutionary Guard to conceal the movement of
sanctions-evading money into and out of Iran, purchase crucial
components for weapons of mass destruction, and evade sanctions in other
ways. These companies follow a similar pattern: they are, typically,
construction or engineering firms run by veterans of the Revolutionary
Guard that appear, to the outside world, as independent companies but
act under the direction of Guard leadership.
After Trump’s speech, the Treasury named Shahid Alamolhoda Industries,
Rastafann Ertebat Engineering Company, and Fanamoj as, essentially,
tools of the Revolutionary Guard. Strikingly, the Treasury did not name
Azarpassillo, an Iranian firm with a leadership made up of lifelong
Revolutionary Guard officers. Azarpassillo’s leaders have been named by U.S.
officials as likely money launderers for the Revolutionary Guard and,
through their international construction operations, the company is
ideally suited to provide W.M.D. components.
Azarpassillo has another interesting connection; one of its apparent
partners in money laundering, the Mammadov family of Azerbaijan, was
also, until quite recently, in business with the Trump Organization. In
fact, for the entire Presidential campaign, the Trump Organization knew
that it was actively involved with a company that was likely laundering
money for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. This is not a wild
conspiracy theory; it is an acknowledged fact, confirmed by Alan Garten,
the Trump Organization’s general counsel, and not disputed by the White
House or any of the people involved. Ivanka Trump directly oversaw the
relationship with the Mammadov family, led by Ziya Mammadov, a man
whom American diplomats have called “notoriously corrupt even for
Azerbaijan.”
The details of Trump’s indirect relationship with the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard Corps were revealed in The New Yorker in March, and, soon afterward, several Democratic senators
asked for more details from the Administration. They were hoping to learn if
the more than five million dollars the Trump Organization received from
the Mammadovs had originated with the Revolutionary Guard. No answer
ever came. Several Republicans who have taken a hard line against Iran
declined to comment on Trump’s profitable relationship with such
enthusiastic allies of the Guard.
There is no reason to think that anyone in the Trump Organization was
intentionally seeking to help the Iranians. Trump’s top lawyer at the
time, Jason Greenblatt, oversaw the contract with the Mammadovs and is
now at the White House, serving as an adviser on the Middle East. An
Orthodox Jew, Greenblatt is known as a supporter of Israel and an
antagonist of Iran. Still, the Trump firm’s relationship with Iran seems
almost inevitable, given the type of business it has pursued since it
was nearly bankrupted by the 2009 financial crisis and various business
missteps. Over the past decade, Trump’s business focussed on providing
its name, for a large fee, to those operating in the shadows of the
global economy. These were people and businesses who were unable—or
unwilling—to work with the vast majority of international companies
which demand comprehensive due diligence. A remarkable number of Trump’s
business partners met one or more of the warning signs of troubling
business practices: they had been
investigated or
convicted of fraud or other economic
crimes; they were
government officials in a position to abuse their power for financial gain; or they were secretive
entities, hidden behind shell companies.
Azarpassillo is one of the largest companies run by Revolutionary Guard
veterans. Much of its business within Iran is with projects run by
Khatam-al Anbia. It also received an enormous contract to build
highways in neighboring Azerbaijan. U.S. officials believe that it got
this contract in a sweetheart deal with Azerbaijan’s then-transportation
minister, Ziya Mammadov. At the same time, Mammadov’s son and brother
signed a contract with the Trump Organization to build a hotel and a
residential tower at the foot of one of the country’s newest highways.
As part of the contract—which was in effect from 2011 to December, 2016,
just after the election—the Trump Organization had the right to look at
the Mammadov family’s business accounting records. Garten, the Trump
Organization lawyer, told me he learned of the Mammadov family’s likely
relationship to Azarpassillo in the summer of 2015. At any point after
this, the Trump Organization could have checked to see if, indeed, they
were receiving funds that originated with the Revolutionary Guard. They
could likely have learned a great deal about how Iranian businesses
closely linked to the Guard operate. They chose not to.