Biggest Scandals The Trump Family Can't Escape

The following article includes allegations of sexual assault.

Scandal has walked hand-in-hand with the Trump name for decades, long before Donald Trump — who has plenty of other weird things about him everyone seems to ignore — entered politics and was twice elected America's president, in 2016 and again in 2024. That goes all the way back to the 1970s, when Trump and his father, Fred Trump, were accused of discriminating against Black people when renting out apartments. Then, in the 1980s, there were rumors of mafia connections, while the 2000s brought about the infamous bankruptcy of his Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City.

Trump's presidency, of course, brought about even more controversy. Not only was he impeached twice (the first president in U.S. history to own that dubious honor), who can forget his notorious musing, during a live news conference, about whether injecting bleach into one's bloodstream could shield citizens from COVID-19.

Meanwhile, the apples have not fallen far from the tree; Trump's children and their spouses have also experienced controversy over the years. To discover more, read on for a rundown of some of the biggest scandals the Trump family can't escape.

Among Donald Trump's many scandals, the sordid allegations of adult film star Stormy Daniels — who has many sides you may not know about — tend to stand out. According to Daniels, she had a brief sexual encounter with Trump shortly after his wife, Melania, gave birth to their son Barron. Then, there was the revelation that Trump's former attorney, Michael Cohen, paid Daniels $130,000 in hush money to secure her silence about the dalliance during the 2016 presidential election. Because Trump reimbursed Cohen in what was stated to be payments for legal services, he was criminally charged in Manhattan of falsifying business records.

In 2023, Trump entered a plea of not guilty and faced a judge and jury in a Big Apple courtroom. That trial was a doozy, revealing another of Trump's alleged extramarital affairs. Former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker testified that the tabloid had utilized a "catch-and-kill" strategy to pay former Playboy model and alleged mistress Karen McDougal $150,000 for the exclusive rights to her story about her months-long affair with Trump — only to sit on the story, which was intentionally never published in order to protect Trump.

The jury eventually delivered a verdict, finding Trump guilty of all 34 felony counts. When the president-elect was sentenced in early January of 2025, Judge Juan Merchan was forced to give Trump an unconditional discharge, explaining that was his only option under such extraordinary circumstances as sentencing a convicted felon who'd just been elected president.

During Donald Trump's first presidential administration, he hired his daughter, Ivanka Trump, and her husband, Jared Kushner, as special White House advisers. Even though the two declined to take salaries, the blatant nepotism was impossible to ignore. Even tougher to ignore was a subsequent report claiming that the couple dubbed "Javanka" raked in a staggering amount of money during their years in public service, with estimates ranging from $172 million to $640 million.

Those millions, however, were chump change compared to the payday that Kushner received when his private equity firm, Affinity Partners, received $2 billion from the Saudi Arabian government's public investment fund in 2021. Many were appalled, including California Congressman Robert Garcia, who subsequently called for an investigation into the circumstances behind how $2 billion in Saudi money wound up in Kushner's pocket. Garcia offered a theory: that the money was quid pro quo for a $110 billion arms deal between the U.S. and the Saudis that Kushner had brokered during his time in his father-in-law's administration.

When presented with that evidence, even Republicans weren't able to defend Kushner. "I've been vocal that I think that what Kushner did crossed the line of ethics," Republican Congressman James Comer from Kentucky said during an appearance on CNN, as reported by The Hill. The whole thing looked even shadier in September 2024 when reports emerged that Affinity Partners reported zero profits, proving Kushner won't be evading this scandal anytime soon. "Jared Kushner's Shady Firm Exposed for the Saudi Scam It Is," read a headline in The New Republic.

Donald Trump's first presidential campaign in 2016 was rocked and roiled when The Washington Post obtained the now-infamous "Access Hollywood" tape. Recorded while he and host Billy Bush yukked it up during a break in filming without realizing their mics were live, Trump bragged about practically sexually assaulting women. "I just start kissing them ... Just kiss. I don't even wait," Trump boasted. "And when you're a star they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab them by the p****."

Conventional wisdom would have dictated that his campaign should have ended then and there, but as the world has learned since then, conventional wisdom rarely applies to Trump. "This was locker room talk," he insisted during his presidential debate with Hilary Clinton.

While Bush was fired, Trump went on to win the election. Both before and while he was serving as commander in chief, numerous women — at least 18 — came forward to share their allegations of being either sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by Trump. While they each detailed very specific accounts, Trump brushed away the accusations, proclaiming his innocence — along with evidence-free claims that they'd been paid to concoct bogus claims. "I mean, they made false statements about me, knowing they were false," he said in a 2018 press conference, as reported by ABC News. "I never met them. I never met these people ... They took money in order to say bad things."

One of the women to accuse Donald Trump of sexual assault was writer E. Jean Carroll, who told her story of being groped and assaulted by him in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room. Trump, then president, responded by stating (via Politico), "I have no idea who this women is. This is a woman who's also accused other men of things, as you know. It is a totally false accusation." Carroll sued Trump for libel in 2019, alleging that he'd defamed her with that remark, and then later expanded her claim to include battery.

In a deposition for the trial, Trump continued to insist he'd never met her. "I know nothing about this nut job," he said, as reported by The Guardian. "She actually indicated that she loved it. Okay?" The case went to trial, and the jury found that not only did Trump defame Carroll, he was also found liable for raping her. Carroll was awarded $5 million in damages.

When Trump continued shooting his mouth off about her, she sued again. This time, the verdict was even more definitive; she was awarded $83.3 million, consisting of $7.3 million in emotional damages, $11 million for damage done to her reputation, and $65 million in punitive damages.

The most controversial scene in the 2024 movie, "The Apprentice," about Donald Trump's tutelage at the hands of notorious attorney Roy Cohn, features Trump (played by Sebastian Stan) brutally raping his then-wife, Ivana Trump (Maria Bakalova). That scene sprang from the 1993 book, "Lost Tycoon: The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump," which featured excerpts from a sworn deposition she gave during her divorce from Trump in the early 1990s. In that deposition, she claimed that the real estate mogul was furious after botched scalp-reduction surgery to cover a bald spot and raped her.

Trump denied her account; during the divorce, his lawyer defended the claim by asserting it was impossible to rape one's spouse. Decades later, she recanted her claim. "I have recently read some comments attributed to me from nearly 30 years ago at a time of very high tension during my divorce from Donald," she said in the 2015 statement, reported ABC News. "The story is totally without merit. Donald and I are the best of friends and together have raised three children that we love and are very proud of."

When the deposition was originally published in 1993, Ivana came forward to clarify and characterize the incident as "marital relations in which he behaved very differently toward me than he had during our marriage," saying she felt "violated" by his actions. "I referred to this as a 'rape,' but I do not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense," she explained in a statement at the time (via CNN).

One Trump scandal that continues to resonate involved the Donald J. Trump Foundation, an organization ostensibly set up to fund other charities. Or at least that's what it was supposed to do. In 2018, New York state Attorney General Letitia James launched a lawsuit against Donald, Donald Jr., Eric, and Ivanka Trump over the foundation. As The New York Times reported, James' suit accused the Trumps of using their foundations "as little more than a checkbook to serve Mr. Trump's business and political interests," describing their actions as "a shocking pattern of illegality." Trump was ultimately found guilty of misappropriating charitable funds, forced to make 19 different admissions of guilt, and ordered to pay $2 million to the charities he'd stiffed. The charity was dissolved.

Meanwhile, his son, Eric Trump, also ran his own charitable organization, the Eric Trump Foundation. In 2016, he came under fire over accusations that the foundation was a front that allowed donors to buy access to the newly elected president. The uproar that ensued compelled him to suspend operations of the charity.

Then came a 2017 investigation by Forbes, which presented evidence that money donors were told would entirely be going to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital was actually partly being funneled to other charities. The Trump Organization was one of them, charging exorbitant sums for the use of Trump properties for fundraisers. A spokesperson for the Eric Trump Foundation told ABC News, "Contrary to recent reports, at no time did the Trump Organization profit in any way from the foundation or any of its activities. ... To infer malicious intent on a charity that has changed so many lives, is not only shameful but is truly disgusting."

Before meeting future husband Donald Trump, Melania Trump was known as Melania Knauss, whose successful modeling career brought her from her native Slovenia to New York City. The notion that she'd someday be America's first lady — twice! — was certainly not on her radar in 2000 when she posed for some extra-spicy, semi-nude photos taken on Trump's private jet that appeared in GQ magazine.

Those pictures, however, were not nearly as scandalous as the fully nude photos she'd posed for early in her modeling career. During the summer of 2016, in the midst of her husband's first presidential campaign, those photos resurfaced, and were printed in the pages of the New York Post. According to the photographer, the pics were shot in 1996, shortly after she arrived in Manhattan, and appeared in Max, a French men's magazine. The Post was just getting warmed up; a few weeks later, the outlet published an even racier photo of her — stark naked, snuggling up to another nude woman in bed.

Trump spokesman Jason Miller downplayed the scandalous images. "They're a celebration of the human body as art," Miller said while appearing on CNN. "There's nothing to be embarrassed about. She's a beautiful woman."

Back in 2004, Donald Trump launched Trump University. Despite the name, it was not actually a university, but hosted real-estate seminars promising to help investors get rich quick. In 2013, Eric Schneiderman — then New York's attorney general — sued the university for fraud. "More than 5,000 people across the country who paid Donald Trump $40 million to teach them his hard sell tactics got a hard lesson in bait-and-switch," Schneiderman said in a statement (via Business Insider). "Mr. Trump used his celebrity status and personally appeared in commercials making false promises to convince people to spend tens of thousands of dollars they couldn't afford for lessons they never got."

In addition to that, Trump U was also targeted by two class-action suits from disgruntled students who claimed they were ripped off, accusing Trump of racketeering. To say the lawsuits didn't go Trump's way is an understatement. When all the dust settled, a federal judge approved a settlement that ordered Trump to pay $25 million, with $21 million going to the victims and $4 million paid to the New York attorney general's office.

"This settlement marked a stunning reversal by President Trump, who for years refused to compensate the victims of his sham university," read a statement from Schneiderman, as reported by ABC News. "My office won't hesitate to hold those who commit fraud accountable, no matter how rich or powerful they may be."

Donald Trump Jr.'s love of hunting has been well documented. One of his animal-killing excursions, however, generated much negative press when he headed to Mongolia in 2019 to shoot at rare, endangered sheep. While that on its own received ample criticism, a whole new scandal emerged when it was reported that he was accompanied by a Secret Service detail — which cost more $76,000 in tax dollars. According to a report from Citizens for Responsible Ethics in Washington, this was $60,000 more than had previously been publicly disclosed.

Meanwhile, another controversial element of the trip was due to the fact that a special permit is required from the Mongolian government to hunt that particular species, argali sheep. When Don Jr. killed one, he was not in possession of a permit — and only acquired one retroactively a month after he'd already shot and killed his prey.

In 2018, tabloids reported that Vanessa Trump, wife of Donald Trump Jr., filed for divorce. Shortly after the news that their 12-year marriage was ending, a followup report from Page Six claimed that he'd been unfaithful during his marriage and had cheated on his wife with singer Aubrey O'Day when she was a contestant on his dad's TV show, "The Celebrity Apprentice," back in 2011. O'Day subsequently admitted they did indeed have an affair, revealing that they had sex for the first time in the bathroom of a gay nightclub.

After his divorce, Donald Jr. entered a relationship with Fox News personality Kimberly Guilfoyle. Together, they were the ultimate MAGA power couple, eventually getting engaged in 2020. That all came crashing down in late 2024, when rumors emerged of his romantic involvement with Palm Beach socialite Bettina Anderson. According to the Daily Mail, Guilfoyle was blindsided by her fiancé's cheating. "Kimberly either didn't know about Bettina — or didn't want to know," a source told the outlet.

Meanwhile, a subsequent report in Page Six indicated that Guilfoyle believed she would still maintain a presence in her ex's life. "Kimberly and Don have known each other for years and have a lot of history together so she feels like they'll always have a connection," said the source. Shortly after rumors of Anderson and Donald Jr.'s relationship became public, Guilfoyle was named as President Donald Trump's ambassador to Greece.

Remember how Eric Trump's foundation was accused of hosting fundraisers at his father's properties and then using the charity's funds to wildly overpay his dad for the privilege? In 2021, similar accusations were made about his wife, Lara Trump, involving the Big Dog Ranch Rescue charity, of which she served as chairwoman of charity events. According to IRS filings obtained by HuffPost, since 2014, the dog rescue had spent a grand total $1,883,160 on fundraising costs for events at Trump-owned properties, including Mar-a-Lago (her father-in-law's Florida getaway where many in the Trump family have gotten married) and one of his Florida golf courses.

Meanwhile, a 2021 permit indicated that the charity planned to spend approximately $225,000 at Mar-a-Lago in a single weekend by hosting a charity event there. Big Dog Ranch Rescue founder and president Lauren Simmons insisted there was nothing shady going on by hosting events at Mar-a-Lago — it was simply a great place. "The quality of service, beauty of the venue and excellent rate provided us as a nonprofit as well as the generosity of supporters who sell-out our event there every year allows us to rescue and home thousands of dogs," she said in a statement.

During her husband's first presidential term, first lady Melania Trump managed to dredge up her fair share of scandal. Who can forget her trip to Africa, when she showed up in Kenya decked out like an 18th-century explorer on safari, pith helmet and all. Then, there was the controversy that erupted when she visited a detention center for migrant children while wearing a coat, upon which was emblazoned on the back, "I really don't care. Do U?"

Yet it was in Christmas of 2018 that she really took a beating on social media, thanks to her questionable taste in holiday decorating. When she unveiled that year's White House Christmas decorations, the decor — a hallway filled with sparsely-decorated, blood-red Christmas trees — was greeted with a mixture of mockery and horror by social media users. As the Washington Post noted, numerous posts referenced "The Handmaid's Tale," while others compared it to the infamous Red Wedding from "Game of Thrones," and some felt it had been lifted from Dante's "Inferno."

The first lady, however, was undeterred by the criticism. "I think they look fantastic," she insisted during a Fox News town hall.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).