Donald Trump with Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson (Right)

Most of Donald Trump's $35 million in real estate deals in 2018 came with a huge political footnote attached to them. A Forbes analysis found the largest deal, yielding $20 million to Trump, came from the sale of a $900 million federally subsidized housing complex in Brooklyn in which the Trump Organization had a 4 percent stake. The Department of Housing & Urban Development had to approve the sale. In other words, the Trump Organization, which is still owned by Trump, needed permission from HUD, which reports to Trump as pr*sident, to turn a profit through a Brooklyn real estate deal. And guess what: HUD greenlit the deal.

Trump also took in another $5.5 million from 36 units sold in a 64-story Las Vegas tower. The catch? About a third of those units were bought by buyers hiding behind limited liability companies so they wouldn't have to disclose their identities. In 2017, USA Today reported that during the two years before Trump became the GOP nominee, only 4 percent of Trump’s building units were acquired by LLCs. So now that Trump's pr*sident, anonymous people are lining his pockets with real estate purchases cloaked through LLCs.

Remember when Trump made a big show of stacking up all the paperwork he was signing in order to supposedly clear up his conflicts of interest and forfeit management of his businesses? Yeah, he's still getting that money.