The revelation comes in light of the charity’s latest report to the IRS, posted online late Monday. | Getty Trump Foundation acknowledges violating 'self-dealing' ban

Donald Trump’s foundation has acknowledged violating a prohibition against using charitable funds to benefit the leaders of the organization or their family members, a practice known as “self-dealing.”

In the charity’s latest report to the IRS, posted online late Monday, the Donald J. Trump Foundation indicates that it transferred income or assets to someone it wasn’t allowed to, such as Trump or a person or an organization close to him, in 2015 and previous years.


The report does not characterize the nature of any such violation. Spokespeople for Trump and for the foundation did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The admission appears to validate extensive reporting by The Washington Post showing that Trump used foundation money to settle legal disputes for his companies and to buy a portrait of himself. The Post reported earlier on Tuesday about the new IRS filing. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has said he is investigating Trump’s foundation “to make sure it’s complying with the laws governing charities in New York.”

The foundation previously paid an IRS penalty for impermissibly contributing to the political campaign of Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, who later decided not to pursue an investigation into Trump University. The payment violated a prohibition on tax-exempt charities making political contributions.

Trump and Bondi have both denied the financial contribution had any link to Bondi’s decision not to investigate the tycoon’s real estate seminar.

Separately, Trump last week agreed to pay $25 million to settle former students’ claims that Trump University defrauded them.

The 2015 IRS form didn’t specify whether the acts of self-dealing were the ones the Post revealed or others.

"This new document appears to corroborate multiple reports of self-dealing that have been repeatedly denied or disregarded by President-elect Trump over the past year," Rep. Elijah Cummings, ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a letter to the foundation's attorney on Tuesday requesting documentation on the self-dealing.

The filing also showed two $10,000 grants to Project Veritas, James O’Keefe’s activist group that released undercover videos purporting to show Democratic voter fraud efforts in October. It wasn’t clear whether the foundation made two identical grants or the grant was listed twice.

The foundation also gave $5,000 to the Media Research Center, Brent Bozell’s right-wing watchdog whose website called the national news media “the propaganda arm of the Left.”

The Post revealed a drop-off in Trump’s own contributions to the foundation since 2007. In 2015, the charity received $566,370 from the Trump Corporation and $50,000 from another company at the same address (Trump Tower) called Trump Productions, according to the IRS filing.

The biggest gift, $150,000, came from the London office of the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, the charity of a Ukrainian businessman who has also given to the Clinton Global Initiative and the Tony Blair Faith Foundation. The New York Real Estate Institute gave $10,000, and a man in Mount Vernon, New York, named Lawrence Roman gave $5,000, according to the filing.

Thomas Weihe, a spokesman for Pinchuk, told POLITICO in an email that the donation was actually a “payment” to facilitate a September 2015 speech by Trump via remote video to a conference organized by Pinchuk’s foundation in Ukraine.

“The payment to President-elect Trump’s foundation was in support of video link appearance at a conference called Yalta European Strategy Annual Meeting,” said Weihe.

He added that, while Pinchuk and Trump met “some years ago in New York,” there is “no business relationship” between the men.

Roman, a plumbing contractor whose company WDF, Inc., had worked on two Trump construction projects a decade ago on Manhattan’s West Side, told POLITICO that “my donation was strictly on a personal basis, nothing to do with business.”

He didn’t seem particularly concerned about the IRS filing admitting the self-dealing violation, saying, “I am not smart enough to answer that question. I leave that to the experts.”

When it came to his donation to the Trump Foundation, Roman said “I have no reason to believe that it was the used for anything other than a good cause.”

Roman said he didn’t “expect to do anymore work for the Trump Organization, but would if they requested it,” though he stressed that the donation was neither an effort to win business nor to curry favor with Trump.

As to whether others might try to use donations to the Trump Foundation to try to curry favor — or win work — with Trump, his companies or his presidential administration, Roman said, “I can't tell you what is in the minds of other people. My dealings with Trump have all been done in an honorable manner.”

In fact, Roman said he first met Trump because the late mothers of the two men were friendly. “Donald was very respectful to my mother and I will always remember that,” said Roman. “My mom had (multiple sclerosis) and he helped her stand up and helped her on with her coat before I could. I was in awe that such a powerful man showed such a humane side.”

Roman wouldn’t say who he voted for in the presidential election. But Federal Election Commission filings show that he donated the maximum $2,700 to the general election campaign of Trump’s Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, and none to Trump. He has given more to Democrats than Republicans over the years, though he did donate to the campaign of the 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney.

“I voted for the person I believed would be best for our country,” he said, adding of President-elect Trump, “I hope and believe he will do a great job rebuilding our infrastructure and creating jobs for our country!”

