The protests in opposition to President Aleksandar Vucic of Serbia had been rising in depth and dimension when an uncommon visitor confirmed up in its capital this month to satisfy with the embattled European chief: Donald Trump Jr., the oldest son of President Trump.
The short go to by Mr. Trump, which included a gathering with Mr. Vucic to speak about U.S. overseas support to Serbia, got here because the Trump household and Jared Kushner, the American president’s son-in-law, had been transferring forward with plans to construct a Trump Worldwide Lodge in Belgrade, the primary such property in Europe.
The lodge is slated to be constructed atop the positioning of the previous Yugoslavian Ministry of Protection headquarters, which was bombed by NATO 26 years in the past on land now owned by the Serbian authorities. Opposition leaders in Serbia have criticized the settlement and referred to as for it to be terminated, elevating the prospect that the deal might be scuttled in a change of energy.
Mr. Trump used the go to as a possibility to specific his assist for Mr. Vucic — a visit that supplied maybe probably the most specific mixing to this point in President Trump’s second time period of U.S. overseas coverage and the Trump household’s monetary pursuits.
On Wednesday, the Serbian Parliament accepted the resignation of its prime minister, bringing down the governing occasion and forcing Mr. Vucic to kind a brand new authorities or maintain new parliamentary elections later this 12 months, creating extra uncertainty there.
A spokesman for Donald Trump Jr. dismissed any suggestion that his go to created a battle of curiosity. The spokesman mentioned the journey had been pushed by a plan to interview Mr. Vucic for Mr. Trump’s podcast, to not step into overseas relations points or the real-estate deal.
“Don hosts one of many largest political podcasts on the earth and was in Serbia strictly in his capability as a podcast host for an interview,” Andy Surabian, the spokesman, mentioned. “He was in and overseas in lower than eight hours and at no level had any discussions with anybody referring to Trump Org.”
The go to, based on two people briefed on the plan, was organized by Brad Parscale, a former campaign manager for President Trump.
Mr. Parscale, an govt at a conservative podcast and radio broadcasting firm, additionally based a political campaign consulting firm. He had pitched advising Mr. Vucic throughout his 2022 re-election marketing campaign, however has asserted he didn’t get employed.
Mr. Vucic is now going through one of many largest assessments of his almost eight years as president. Protests in opposition to his administration erupted in November after the collapse of a concrete construction atop a railway station walkway that killed 15, an accident that demonstrators blamed partly on authorities corruption.
The go to by Mr. Trump final week had introduced a quick pause in these troubles and instantly grew to become nationwide information in Serbia, with Mr. Vucic and his prime advisers pointing to it as an indication that the Trump administration helps Mr. Vucic, regardless of the rising protests within the streets of the capital.
“A cordial dialog with Donald Trump Jr., the son of U.S. President Donald Trump about bilateral relations between Serbia and the usA. and present matters that form the worldwide political and financial scene,” Mr. Vucic wrote in a social media posting after the assembly.
Marko Djuric, Serbia’s overseas affairs minister, added in a television interview after Mr. Trump’s go to that the presence of President Trump’s son “offers nice momentum for a superb begin to relations with the brand new administration.”
Others within the nation had fairly a special view.
“The son of President Trump is right here to attempt to give Vucic a serving to hand,” mentioned Dragan Jonic, an opposition-party member of Serbia’s parliament. “It’s clearly a battle of curiosity, as Vucic is attempting to carry on to energy and the Trumps need to hold their actual property deal alive.”
Mr. Vucic’s authorities signed an agreement final Might with Affinity World Growth, an organization arrange by Mr. Kushner. The corporate plans to take a position $500 million to construct a 175-room Trump lodge with 1,500 luxurious flats and different facilities on the former protection ministry website in Belgrade.
“We’re thrilled to increase our presence into Europe,” Eric Trump, one other of President Trump’s sons, mentioned in January, when the inclusion of a Trump Worldwide Lodge to the undertaking was first publicly introduced. Eric Trump is the lead member of the family operating its actual property firm.
However Donald Trump Jr. can be an executive vice president at Trump Group, which operates the household’s lodges, golf programs and different property, and helps with planning for the Serbian lodge undertaking.
Two people who had been briefed on Donald Trump Jr.’s journey, however who spoke on situation of anonymity as a result of they weren’t licensed to debate it publicly, mentioned Mr. Trump was not paid for taking the journey. However his airfare, and that of his girlfriend, Bettina Anderson, was coated by Mr. Parscale, who has a enterprise companion based mostly in Serbia. Mr. Parscale declined to remark or to reveal the title of his Serbian enterprise companion.
Virginia Canter, a former ethics adviser to the Worldwide Financial Fund, mentioned that Donald Trump Jr.’s assembly with the Serbian president was paying homage to exercise by Hunter Biden, who was accused by Republicans of leveraging the place of his father, Joseph R. Biden Jr., as vice chairman to make profitable abroad enterprise offers.
“It’s form of the peak of hypocrisy that they had been involved about Hunter Biden’s overseas work,” mentioned Ms. Canter, who additionally served as an ethics lawyer within the Clinton White Home and now works at a nonprofit group referred to as State Democracy Defenders Motion, which has been crucial of Mr. Trump.
In Ms. Canter’s view, the battle of curiosity in Donald Trump Jr.’s case is extra specific.
“Don Jr., as a surrogate for his father, is utilizing the general public workplace of the president of america to assist the president of Serbia keep in workplace — whereas furthering the Trump household’s private monetary curiosity,” she mentioned. “It’s unethical. It’s offensive.”
It stays unclear how a lot Mr. Trump’s presence in Serbia might have helped Mr. Vucic.
A number of days after the go to, the streets of central Belgrade had been jammed with greater than 100,000 demonstrators for what organizers referred to as one of many largest protests within the nation’s historical past.
Mr. Vucic’s authorities supplied the Trump household a deal final 12 months, as President Trump was operating for re-election, to achieve entry to the prime real-estate growth website in the midst of Belgrade.
The federal government is leasing the positioning to Mr. Kushner’s real-estate partnership for 99 years, based on Serbian officers. Affinity World Growth, the Kushner affiliate, in return has agreed to construct the lodge and luxurious flats in a partnership with Mohamed Alabbar, a enterprise govt from the United Arab Emirates.
Donald J. Trump, earlier than he was first elected president and whereas he was nonetheless operating the household real-estate enterprise, had first thought-about constructing a lodge at this exact site in 2013 and associates of the Trump Group traveled to Belgrade to inspect the location. The undertaking didn’t come collectively earlier than Mr. Trump’s election in 2016, however Mr. Kushner revived it final 12 months whereas Mr. Trump was operating once more for workplace.
The lodge undertaking had generated smaller scale protests in Belgrade even earlier than the deadly rail station cover collapse late final 12 months.
Opposition leaders like Mr. Jonic argued that the previous Ministry of Protection website was symbolic as a result of it was attacked by NATO forces led by america in 1999 when Serbia and its neighbor Montenegro had been a part of Yugoslavia. It shouldn’t be turned over to American real-estate builders looking for a revenue, the opposition leaders mentioned.
“Are you able to think about an American president, any president, giving West Level as a present to an offshore firm, solely to demolish it and construct a lodge?” Aleksandar Jovanovic, a member of Serbia’s parliament, mentioned final 12 months because the deal was being negotiated, referencing the U.S. Navy Academy.
“One must have a vivid creativeness to think about that. Sadly, what’s unthinkable in America is a tragic actuality in Serbia,” he mentioned at the moment.
Donald Trump Jr., along with being proven the structure of downtown Belgrade by Serbia’s president, carried out a virtually hourlong interview with Mr. Vucic that was broadcast in recent days on Mr. Trump’s podcast, “Triggered.”
In the course of the dialog, Mr. Trump in contrast the protests in response to the November rail station collapse to criticism of the Jan. 6, 2021, assault by his father’s supporters on the Capitol in Washington.
“It was later weaponized,” Mr. Trump mentioned through the interview, earlier than persevering with with theories raised by Trump allies associated to occasions in Washington “like our, , Jan. 6 became one thing that it wasn’t, to incite probably even a revolution.”
Mr. Trump and Mr. Vucic additionally talked about Russia and the warfare in Ukraine and Mr. Vucic’s work with President Trump throughout his first time period.
They each asserted individually that funding from the U.S. Company for Worldwide Growth, which the Trump administration has slashed during the last two months, had been improperly utilized by some nonprofit teams in Serbia to play a task within the protests, though neither supplied proof of this allegation.
The Trump household’s evident assist of Mr. Vucic is far appreciated, the Serbian president made clear, including that he believes it’s a part of the rationale President Trump is so fashionable in Serbia.
“This was the nation the place Trump was having fun with the most important recognition in all the Europe by far,” Mr. Vucic mentioned. “I’m not flattering him or I’m not flattering you. I’m saying what individuals right here suppose.”
Andrew Higgins contributed reporting.
