Author: Cozmin Gușă
Last night, participants of the Florida meeting between Eric Trump and a delegation of Romanian businesspeople, partners of the U.S. president’s son for real estate development projects in Romania, sent me a set of photos. I’m attaching one of those photos, which can be described as follows:
The location is Mar-a-Lago Club, Florida, USA. Eric Trump stands in the middle, flanked by Ștefania and Ștefan Berciu. On the ends are Avram Gal and Gabriel Constantin, the vice president of the Trump Organization. The other Romanians in the picture, the Berciu family, are publicly known especially for their past business association in Cluj with Elena Udrea, while Avram Gal is a businessman and the president of the PSD branch in Câmpia Turzii.
What kind of projects are we talking about? Initial investments exceed $500 million and are aimed at constructing the famous Trump Towers in Romania as well, specifically in Bucharest and Cluj. Details will probably be presented more extensively in the press starting today. I can, however, explain the significance and a few foreseeable consequences of such a partnership.
Although Donald Trump has been often mentioned and repeatedly invited to Romania over the past ten years, ever since he won his first U.S. presidential term, he has never wished to visit our country. More recently, he has shown clearly that he isn’t interested in the state of Romania’s eroded democracy, even though the country declares itself a “strategic partner” of the United States. The only exception was a visit by his son, Donald Trump Jr., during this year’s presidential campaign, a visit perceived as an indirect gesture of support for candidate Victor Ponta, which, as a result, did not attract much public attention.
Now, this business project that the Trump family is developing in Romania represents an important signal, first of all for American businessmen around the White House leader, who will thus directly understand that Romania can serve as a kind of Terra Nova for investment. That signal will also be picked up by other business groups around the world. Another consequence will be of a security nature (yes, that’s how the world works): a country that hosts investments belonging to the sitting U.S. president’s family suddenly becomes much safer, and, of course, much more closely monitored.
Finally, even just through future discussions about these family business projects, Donald Trump’s attention toward Romania will gain concrete meaning. From that will stem geopolitical consequences I already anticipate, and which I will define more precisely at the appropriate time.
And to conclude, it’s clear that the attention of figures like Putin and Xi, too, when and if Romania comes up, will shift accordingly. That’s something we wanted anyway, and it can be considered a reason for satisfaction. That’s why I’ve declared Eric Trump the “Man of the Day” today, on Gold FM.
