The kleptocrats aren’t just stealing money. They’re stealing democracy
A shadow world of secret wealth now threatens us all. We need to shut it down, argues Anne Applebaum
Donald Trump opened Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in 1983 and occupied the penthouse himself. The building was intended to advertise its owner’s wealth, and also to attract other rich tenants — including, ironically, the very secretive rich. Trump would sell 43 condos in Manhattan’s flashiest building to shell companies based in jurisdictions such as Panama, the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands, which conceal corporate records…