The sons of President Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick stand to see a big windfall after businesses tied to the families helped secure a $1.6 billion mining deal in Kazakhstan, according to a new report.
After Trump and Lutnick closed a deal for an American company called Kaz Resources to mine one of the world’s largest untapped reserves of tungsten last November, records indicate that firms tied to their sons saw financial gain from the contract, the New York Times reported.
Dominari Securities — which is housed at Trump Tower in New York and partly owned by the president’s two eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump — had joined other investors to take a 20% stake in a company related to the project.
At the same time, Cantor Fitzgerald — an investment company controlled by Lutnick’s family and overseen by his sons Brandon and Kyle Lutnick — helped one of the investors working with Dominari raise $210 million in new capital.
The dealings have raised questions about the Trump and Lutnick families’ financial gains under deals struck during the president’s second term.
“The only special interest guiding the Trump administration’s decision-making is the best interest of the American people,” White House spokesman Kush Desai told The Post.
“Securing and reshoring America’s critical supply chains has been a top priority for President Trump, and Secretary Lutnick along with the rest of the Administration continue to take historic action to safeguard America’s national and economic security.”
The Kazakhstan deal manifested last year as the US moved to increase its tungsten supply, a precious metal needed to produce missiles, fighter jets, computer chips and other critical goods to compete against China.
During the negotiations, Lutnick pushed Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to give the mining contract to Kaz Resources executive chairman Pini Althaus and his backers, writing in a letter that the Trump administration “fully supports” the company.
When Tokayev arrived in New York in September to meet at the St. Regis hotel to discuss the deal, Trump personally called in to handle the final negotiations and seal the deal, Althaus told the Times.
Within weeks of the St. Regis talks, Dominari Securities and Cantor Fitzgerald mad their move, with the deal officially signed on Nov. 6, just six days after the investment involving the Trump sons and their partners, the Times reported.
While none of the $1.6 billion in government support for the Kazakh deal has come through yet, federal filings suggest that both Dominari and Cantor earned fees for their work helping raise capital for the project, according to the Times.
Dominari, which hired the Trump brothers as paid advisers after the president returned to the White House, did not immediately respond to the Post’s request for comment.
The Trump brothers have said they were not involved in the specifics of the deal, with Eric writing that he has always remained a “passive investor,” the Times reported.
Cantor said it merely serves as a partner for companies to raise capital when investing in the critical minerals industry.
“Cantor’s involvement is limited to supporting capital raises in the public markets and does not include participation in negotiations with the current or any prior administration,” the company told The Post.
The Commerce Department told the Times that neither Secretary Lutnick nor anyone at the department “interacted with or had any discussions whatsoever with Cantor Fitzgerald regarding the rare earth minerals industry,” noting that the Trump official had sold his ownership stake in the company.
Althaus maintains that he had never met the Trump brothers during his hunt for investors and did not know they were involved.
“I can see how the optics might be disturbing to some people, but that’s unfortunate because this company and this project goes way beyond any one president, let alone any family,” he told the Times.
