The Trump Organization’s Website Is Full Of Falsehoods
No longer in office, Trump is still spreading misinformation. Just look at what his company is saying about itself.
Visit the Trump Organization’s website, and you’ll find glassy New York skyscrapers, rolling Virginia vines and a shimmering Vegas pool. Alongside all the glamor, there’s hard data—facts and figures about the president’s business. Much of that data, however, is not true.
Consider the statistics about 40 Wall Street. The website calls the skyscraper a “72-story landmarked address.” It’s actually a 63-story building, according to a document filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The site says it has 1.3 million square feet of office space. It really has 1.1 million, according to the document.
What The Trump Organization Claims
Same building, two descriptions. The president’s website (above) boasts that 40 Wall Street is bigger than an SEC filing (below) says it is.
What The Documents Say
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The website says the president’s hotel in Las Vegas, a golden tower just off the strip, “rises 64 stories high.” It would, if its floors didn’t jump from the eighth level to the 16th level. But since a drawing filed with local officials appears to show them doing just that, the building actually has more like 57 stories.
What The Trump Organization Claims
At Trump’s building in Las Vegas, it takes some strange math to get to 64 floors. Above the ground level, there’s an office, five floors of parking, a pool, and then—suddenly—the “16th level,” according to an architectural drawing (below).
What The Documents Say
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The site says Trump Tower stands “68 stories above Fifth Avenue.” But there are fewer than 65 floors in the building, according to an analysis of documents filed with the SEC and New York City. The site claims the “first 26 floors are comprised of luxury offices,” even though the SEC filing notes just 13 floors of office space.
What The Trump Organization Claims
Lots of buildings skip the 13th floor. But, as an SEC filing (below) shows, Trump Tower skips the sixth through 13th floors, jumping straight from the fifth level to the 14th.
What The Documents Say
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The inflated figures don’t just appear on the Trump Organization’s website. Pick a major news organization, and there’s a good chance it has amplified Trump’s claims. A brief search turned up examples from the New York Times, the Washington Post, Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, CBS News and, yes, Forbes. Newsrooms train reporters to get their information from direct sources, which can make it easy to overlook false claims, especially ones involving trivial matters. After all, who would lie about the size of their buildings?
Donald Trump, of course. In fact, he’s been employing such tactics for years. Veteran Trump chronicler Timothy O’Brien called him out for inflating the number of floors in Trump Tower…
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