Democrats in the US Congress have launched an investigation into whether Jared Kushner’s desire to secure a billion-dollar rescue for a skyscraper owned by his family played a role in President Donald Trump’s decision to support a Saudi-led blockade of Qatar.
Lawmakers from the Senate Finance and House Foreign Affairs committees on Wednesday sent a wide-ranging document request to Brookfield Asset Management, which counts the Qatar Investment Authority among its major financial backers and signed a long-term lease on the office tower in 2018.
The deal followed frenetic efforts by the Kushner family to raise enough money to meet a $1.2bn mortgage payment on the tower, and coincided with a series of sharp turns in US foreign policy towards Qatar.