Umar Kremlev, a Russian oligarch close to Vladimir Putin, secretly paid hundreds of thousands of dollars toward Donald Trump Jr.'s wedding in the Bahamas in May, ProPublica reported Monday. He rented one of the two private islands, he paid for the fireworks, and his team helped plan the party. Then he stood on the beach and watched the president's son lift his bride into the air.
Kremlev runs the International Boxing Association, the body Gazprom, the Russian state gas company, filled with tens of millions of dollars. Putin gave him the Order of Friendship in April. Days before the wedding he was in China with Putin's delegation, Chinese state media reported. "Umar is guided by Putin," a former IBA board member told ProPublica.
ProPublica has the payment records and three people who know the event. Trump Jr.'s spokesman did not dispute the payments. "Umar is a personal friend of Don," he said.
Kremlin money doesn't need a back channel when it has a guest list. Around 50 people came: Jared Kushner, Eric Trump, executives from the Trump crypto company World Liberty Financial — and a knot of Russians who stood off by themselves, speaking Russian. "What are they doing here?" one guest recalled thinking. Trump Jr. told his podcast: "If you're on that list, you weren't talking."
Trump Jr. is worth roughly $300 million, Forbes estimates. He could have paid. Kremlev paid instead, and the bill never carried his name.
