With bibles, tokens and watches, Trump made millions, new disclosures show
By Fredreka Schouten, Kit Maher and Elisabeth Buchwald, CNN
(CNN) — President Donald Trump has made millions from his family’s cryptocurrency venture, private golf clubs and hawking everything from bibles to watches – as he’s capitalized on his political prominence to expand his business empire, according to financial documents released Friday afternoon.
One of the biggest sources of income Trump disclosed was a $57 million token sale through WLF Holdco LLC, which owns World Liberty Financial Inc. WLF is a Trump family crypto company and boasts that it is actively run in part by the president’s sons.
Meanwhile, Trump owns roughly between $1 million and $5 million worth of the cryptocurrency ethereum. He campaigned on being the most crypto-friendly president, advertising a more hands-off approach to regulating digital assets compared to prior administrations.
Friday’s filings, running more than 230 pages, mark the first disclosures of the billionaire’s assets and liabilities since Trump returned to the White House in January. And they give the public the first snapshot of some of his recent earnings from deals inked while the Republican campaigned for office last year.
Asked about the president’s myriad business ventures, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump has been transparent.
“President Trump, Vice President Vance, and senior White House staff have completed required ethics briefings and financial reporting obligations. The Trump Administration is committed to transparency and accessibility for the American people,” she said in a statement to CNN.
Federal law does not require presidents to divest their holdings, although previous officeholders have taken steps to do so or wall them off in a blind trust.
Trump’s assets are in a trust managed by his children, and the Trump Organization earlier this year announced that the president would not have any involvement in the day-to-day running of the company. But he still owns and benefits from his sprawling real estate and branding empire.
Friday’s filings show that a variety of licensing deals the president has with companies selling products using his name, image and likeness – ranging from sneakers to watches – yielded millions in royalties for Trump.
That includes the more than $1.3 million Trump made from Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA” Bible. On the 2024 campaign trail, Trump released a video urging supporters to purchase the Bible to “make America pray again.”
Trump also earned $2.5 million from Trump sneakers and fragrances and $2.8 million selling “Trump Watches.” (CNN went on a hunt for the makers of the “Swiss-made” watches in October 2024 and ended up in a small city in Wyoming.) Additionally, Trump made more than $1 million on a “45” guitar, denoting his place in the line of US presidents during his first term.
The filings also reflect the large civil judgments that still loom over the president.
He reported liabilities in excess of $50 million owed both to the New York attorney general and E. Jean Carroll, a former magazine columnist who alleged Trump raped her in a New York department store in the 1990s and then defamed her when he denied her claim and suggested she made up the story to boost sales of her book.
On Friday, an appeals court rejected an attempt from Trump to review a $5 million judgment against him in a case brought by Carroll. The jury in that case found that Trump sexually abused Carroll, sufficient to hold him liable for battery, but did not find that Carroll proved he raped her. Trump has denied all the claims. Trump also is separately asking the appeals court to throw out an $83 million jury verdict in a second judgment Carroll won against him.
The other civil judgment of more than $50 million the president disclosed stems from the $454 million that a New York judge ordered Trump to pay last year in a civil fraud case brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Trump has appealed that case.
Trump’s private clubs also generate substantial income – led by the president’s flagship property, Mar-a-Lago, which brought in a little more than $50.1 million in revenue – down from about $57 million in a previous filing last year.
The filings also reveal more about the speaking fees first lady Melania Trump earned during last year’s campaign. She was paid $475,000 for a speaking engagement with the Log Cabin Republicans, which represents LGBTQ conservatives, in New York in July.
Her paid speeches have drawn scrutiny in the past. A previous disclosure showed Melania Trump received $237,500 for an April 2024 engagement in Palm Beach, Florida.
She also made nearly $217,000 related to the sale of NFTs, non-fungible tokens.
Disclosures for Vice President JD Vance also were released Friday and show that the former Ohio senator and second lady Usha Vance have millions of dollars in assets, but their wealth does not come close to Trump’s.
Vance received between $50,001 and $100,000 in royalties for “Hillbilly Elegy,” his 2016 memoir that catapulted him to fame and later was adapted into a movie.
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