The Trump Organization is holding discussions to potentially bring a Trump-branded building to a Saudi government-owned project worth some $63 billion, The New York Times reported Saturday, ahead of US President Donald Trump’s White House meeting next week with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
“Nothing announced yet, but soon to be,” Jerry Inzerillo, chief executive of the Diriyah development and a longtime friend of Trump, told the outlet, adding it is “just a matter of time” until the agreement is inked.
The report said neither the Trump Organization nor Eric Trump, the US president’s second-oldest son who oversees the business, responded to questions on the matter, but noted that “it can be hard to separate hype from reality in international real estate discussions.”
The deal would be inked with Dar Global, a subsidiary of a major Saudi real-estate development firm with close ties to the royal family. According to a second report in the New York Times published Saturday, the firm “has become the Trump Organization’s most important foreign business partner and a key conduit to Gulf Arab governments and companies.”
According to the report, previous Dar Global deals to license the Trump name brought some $21.9 million to the Trump Organization in 2024 alone.
The reports came days before the president is set to host the de facto Saudi leader in Washington, where they are expected to sign economic and defense agreements.
US President Donald Trump arrives with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for the group photo with Gulf Cooperation Council leaders during the GCC Summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 14, 2025. (Alex Brandon/AP)
Trump said Friday that he was considering agreeing to a deal to supply Saudi Arabia with F-35 stealth fighter jets and that he hopes Riyadh will normalize relations with Israel.
It will be the first visit to the White House in seven years for the Saudi crown prince, and according to the Times, Bin Salman is looking to “potentially advance a deal to transfer American nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia.”
As for the potential Diriyah real estate deal, the report said it was first presented to Trump during his recent visit to Saudi Arabia, where he toured the site with Inzerillo and Saudi officials who looked to interest him in investment opportunities.
US President Donald Trump speaks at the Saudi-US Investment Forum at the King Abdulaziz International Conference Center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Tuesday, May 13, 2025. (AP/Alex Brandon)
“It turned out to be a good stroke of luck and maybe a little bit clever of us to say, ‘OK, let’s appeal to him as a developer’ — and he loved it,” Inzerillo said.
Trump and Prince Mohammed talked “not just as heads of state,” but as “visionaries and developers,” the project’s CEO told the Times, adding that the two looked over architectural plans and models during a state dinner.
“You normally wouldn’t do that in a state dinner. It’s not really the normal protocol,” he told an associate who questioned the idea at the time, according to Inzerillo. “But that’s because you’re looking at the president of the United States as the president of the United States. You’re not looking at him as a developer.”
Inzerillo also noted specific interest from Eric Trump, adding that he and the president’s son-in-law and White House Middle East adviser Jared Kushner had visited Diriyah in the past.
Eric Trump, executive vice president of the Trump Organization and son of United States President Donald Trump, speaks during the Bitcoin Asia 2025, at the Hong Kong Exhibition Centre in Hong Kong, on August 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Daniel Ceng)
While nothing has been announced, the report that the president’s family business is nearing a major real estate deal with a state-owned project of a close ally highlights the increasingly blurred lines between Trump’s diplomacy and his personal business dealings.
Since Trump became president for the second time earlier this year, the Trump Organization has inked several high-profile real estate deals in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, including a Trump Tower complex in Jeddah and a golf course near Doha.
While many critics have called out the president and his family business for conflict of interest concerns that his policy decisions could bleed into the business interests of his family, administration officials have repeatedly brushed off such concerns by noting that the Trump Organization is managed by his children and that the president has no input on its daily affairs.
