New Jersey officials are allowing President Donald Trump’s golf clubs to, temporarily, continue serving alcohol to patrons under the condition they don’t touch any profits made from alcohol sales.
More than a year into a back-and-forth battle between Trump’s golf properties and the New Jersey Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control, the state agreed to give Trump National Golf Clubs in Bedminster and Colts Neck a temporary authorization permit to serve liquor.
The clubs’ liquor licenses have been under review since Trump was convicted on 34 counts of falsifying business records in New York last year. New Jersey law prohibits a person convicted of a crime “involving moral turpitude” from having a liquor license.
But the last-minute extension, issued on June 30, gives the golf club six months of elbow room to sell alcoholic beverages while its liquor licenses are still being reviewed.
It comes with hefty conditions, though, that require the clubs to put proceeds from liquor sales in an untouched account, separate from the clubs’ other income, and prohibit any members of the LLCs that own the liquor licenses from profiting off the sales.
As of now, the golf clubs’ liquor licenses are held by two separate LLCs, which are owned by the Trump Organization, which is operated by the president’s sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump.
But the New Jersey attorney general determined that Trump is a beneficiary of the clubs’ liquor sales, in part because both the LLCs are listed as assets under Trump’s revocable trust, according to a 2018 document.
The state was supposed to hold a license-revocation hearing last July but it was canceled. It’s unclear if another date has been set for the hearing.
As par tof the temporary authorization permits, the state’s alcohol regulators also told the LLCs that hold the liquor licsenses to provide information about “the corporate structure, ownership, and beneficiary interests” behind the liceneses by Sptember 30.
Failure to do so could lead to the temporary permits being revoked.
The Independent has asked the New Jersey Attorney General’s office and Trump Bedminster Golf Club for comment
