The family business · Before politics · № 8
Aras Agalarov's Crocus Group pays about $6 million to host Trump's Miss Universe pageant in Moscow
“I'm in Moscow for Miss Universe tonight - picking a winner is very hard, they are all winners. Total sellout of arena. Big night in Russia!”
- Date
- Subject
- Russia
- Benefit
- Gifts and payments
- Government
- Russia
- Beneficiary
- Donald Trump (co-owner of the Miss Universe Organization)
- Amount
- approximately $6 million (licensing fee)
- Topic
- Ethics & conflicts
- Era
- Before politics
What happened
The Crocus Group, owned by the developer Aras Agalarov, signed a contract in June 2013 with the Miss Universe Organization, which Trump had co-owned since 1996, to stage the pageant at Crocus City Hall in Moscow on November 9, 2013. The Senate intelligence committee reported in 2020 that Crocus paid approximately $6 million as a licensing fee and incurred about $6 million more in expenses, and that the organization's president called it one of its most lucrative deals. The committee found that Agalarov has "significant ties to the Russian government" and access to President Vladimir Putin; Putin presented him with the Order of Honor on October 29, 2013. The Agalarovs told the pageant's organizers that the financing would be strictly private. During the trip Trump was the guest at an event hosted by Agalarov and the state-owned Sberbank, and he wrote afterward to Sberbank's chairman, Herman Gref, that he had done "an absolutely fantastic job." A meeting with Putin that Trump had sought did not take place.
Sources
- Report of the Select Committee on Intelligence, United States Senate, on Russian Active Measures Campaigns and Interference in the 2016 U.S. Election, Volume 5: Counterintelligence Threats and Vulnerabilities
- Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election
- Tweet by @realDonaldTrump, 2013-11-09
- Country and Territory Ratings and Statuses, 1973-2024