Trump rented space on Fifth Avenue for 4 years to a bank controlled by the Iranian gov't.

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Zeddonymous @ZeddRebel
For four years Trump rented space on Fifth Avenue to a bank publicly ID'd by the US government as controlled by Iran https://t.co/CDvT38URwF

Donald Trump’s real estate organization rented New York office space from 1998 to 2003 to an Iranian bank that U.S. authorities have linked to terrorist groups and Iran’s nuclear program.

Trump inherited Bank Melli, one of Iran’s largest state-controlled banks, as a tenant when he purchased the General Motors Building on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, according to public records reviewed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and the Center for Public Integrity. The Trump Organization kept the bank on as a tenant for four more years after the U.S. Treasury Department designated Bank Melli in 1999 as being controlled by the Iranian government.

U.S. officials later alleged that Bank Melli had been used to obtain sensitive materials for Iran’s nuclear program. U.S. authorities also alleged that the bank had been used between 2002 and 2006 to funnel money to a unit of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard that has sponsored terrorist attacks — a period that overlapped with the time the bank rented office space from Trump.

The Trump Organization’s dealings with the Iranian bank shed more light on Trump’s wide-ranging business interests, which sometimes stand at odds with his blunt declarations on the campaign trail. Trump has denounced Iran as a “big enemy,” blasted Hillary Clinton for not taking a harder line against the Iranian regime and charged that donations from foreign governments to the Clinton Foundation amounted to evidence of corruption. His five-year stint as Bank Melli’s landlord provides an example of the Trump Organization itself doing business with a government hostile to the United States.

read more: https://t.co/CDvT38URwF

NBC Nightly News ‏@NBCNightlyNews 1h1 hour ago
Records: Trump Org. kept Iranian bank on as a tenant, despite being designated as controlled by Iranian gov't. http://nbcnews.to/2dDCW6p

NBC Nightly News ‏@NBCNightlyNews 1h1 hour ago
MORE: US official later alleged bank was used to obtain sensitive materials for nuclear program, funnel money to Revolutionary Guard unit.

The Trump Organization's dealings with the Iranian bank shed more light on Donald Trump's wide-ranging business interests, which sometimes stand at odds with his blunt declarations on the campaign trail. Trump has denounced Iran as a "big enemy," blasted Hillary Clinton for not taking a harder line against the Iranian regime and charged that donations from foreign governments to the Clinton Foundation amounted to evidence of corruption. His five-year stint as Bank Melli's landlord provides an example of the Trump Organization itself doing business with a government hostile to the United States.

"It's a pretty hypocritical position to take," said Richard Nephew, who served from 2013 to 2015 as principal deputy coordinator of sanctions policy at the U.S. State Department and spent nearly a decade working on Iran sanctions in the administrations of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. "It suggests that his principles are pretty flexible when it comes to him getting paid."

A court document obtained by ICIJ indicates that Bank Melli's rent on more than 8,000 square feet on the GM Building's 44th floor may have topped half a million dollars a year.

The Trump campaign declined to answer any of ICIJ's questions about Bank Melli...

read more: http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-group-did-business-iranian-bank-later-linked-terror-n657636