Amid reports that Donald Trump possibly gained tax benefits by burying his ex-wife, Ivana Trump, near the first hole of his Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, people online are raising questions about whether her children approved of their mother’s “sad” and “miserly” final resting place.
“I couldn’t believe her three kids — whom she apparently loved & who loved her — would allow their father to treat their mother like this,” tweeted Brooke Harrington, a professor of sociology at Dartmouth college in New Hampshire. Harrington looked into claims over the weekend that the former president was using his first-wife’s burial location as a way to benefit his tax planning.
“Burying Ivana in little more than a pauper’s grave disgraces them all,” Harrington added in a Twitter thread Saturday.
Doubt there is a new low? This is the miserly grave of Ivana Trump, also known as a tax break for her ex-husband. pic.twitter.com/Tozbyp33LY
— Steven Beschloss (@StevenBeschloss) July 31, 2022
Harrington has written a book and a New York Times article about how Trump and other ultra-rich Americans exploit U.S. tax laws to get away with paying as little tax as possible. She said the final resting place for Ivana Trump, who died at age 73 after a fall in her New York City home, appears to constitute “a trifecta of tax avoidance.”
As a tax researcher, I was skeptical of rumors Trump buried his ex-wife in that sad little plot of dirt on his Bedminster, NJ golf course just for tax breaks.
So I checked the NJ tax code & folks…it's a trifecta of tax avoidance. Property, income & sales tax, all eliminated. pic.twitter.com/VDZBlDyuhQ
— Brooke Harrington (@EBHarrington) July 31, 2022
This conclusion, according to Harrington and a report in The Guardian, is based on New Jersey’s tax code, which exempts all cemetery land from all taxes, rates, and assessments.
The tax code doesn’t stipulate a minimum number of human remains for the tax breaks to kick in, so it “looks like one corpse will suffice to make at least three forms of tax to vanish,” added Harrington, who also tweeted the full New Jersey tax code for cemetery land.
Ivana Trump’s grave potentially has tax implications for a Trump family trust that owns the golf course, The Guardian said.
Speculation about the tax benefits of Ivana Trump’s burial spot emerged last week when the New York Post published photos of her freshly dug grave in a patch of dirt and grass near the first hole. The sad-looking grave for the one-time queen of glitzy 1980s Manhattan high society is only marked by a simple plaque that bears her name and her dates of birth and death.
Following Ivana Trump’s death, all three of her children — Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump — wrote loving tributes to her on social media. In an Instagram post, Ivanka Trump wrote, “Heartbroken by the passing of my mother. … I will miss her forever and will keep her memory alive in our hearts always.”
Trump Jr. also wrote: “Mom, we will miss you incredibly. … From your sense of humor to your sense of adventure, I am who I am today because of you. I love you very much.” The Trump Organization vice president concluded his post with “RIP.”
Ivana Trump is the first person known to be buried at Bedminster, where Trump and his family spend time each summer, but previous reports say that the former real estate mogul-turned-Republican leader has long proposed ideas to launch different types of cemetery operations in or near his golf course.
Documents published by ProPublica show that the Trump family trust previously sought to designate a nearby property in Hackettstown, New Jersey, as a non-profit cemetery company. Back in 2012, Trump also was looking to build a cemetery with about 500 grave sites at Bedminster that would be open to any member of his golf club, NPR reported. Members of the golf club pay about $150,000 to join the golf club and an additional $20,000 in annual dues. Trump also wanted to build a chapel and large, ornate mausoleum for himself in the middle of the golf course, but that proposal was rejected by local officials.
More recently, the Trump Organization has proposed building a pair of graveyards at his golf course, the Washington Post reported in 2017. One would have 294 lots for sale to the public. The idea is that buyers, presumably avid golfers, “could pay for a kind of eternal membership” to the club, the Washington Post said.
The other gravesite would hold about 10 plots overlooking the first hole, which would be intended for Trump and his family. The Washington Post said in 2017 that the Trump Organization had received approval from local officials to go ahead with its cemetery plans.
While Trump was in the White House, it was up to Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump to decide whether to proceed. Construction has yet to begin on either one.
Perhaps Donald Jr., Eric and Ivanka Trump saw an opportunity off sorts in their mother’s death to begin creating the small family plot near the first hole.
Harrington and others online said that it would be unusual for Donald Trump, who divorced Ivana Trump in 1990, to have a legal say over where his first wife would be buried. So that would leave it to her survivors, who include her three children, to make the final decision.
“Ivana’s kids and mother would have had to OK this,” Harrington tweeted. “THAT’s the shocking part.”
Ivana Trump is buried in a section of the club below the backside of the first tee, the Post said. Golfers wouldn’t necessarily see it as the tee off.
When it comes to the Trump family going into the cemetery business, they may have realized that it’s not the best way to make money in New Jersey because the land is expensive but cemetery plots usually are cheap, and people are increasingly turning to cremation, the Washington Post said.
The Guardian added that the tax benefits of burying Ivana Trump at the golf course wouldn’t be that huge. It is unlikely that the plot where she is buried would deliver tax exemptions to the entire Bedminster property.
On the other hand, it’s likely that someone such as Trump would look for any kind of tax break he can get. After all, as Harrington wrote in the New York Times, very rich people can afford to pay specialist attorneys and accountants tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars every year to look for loopholes to keep their tax bills as low as possible.
Trump also has found another way to reduce his tax bill at Bedminster, according to the Washington Post. He previously designated the unused parcel, apparently where Ivana is buried, as a farm because some trees on the site are turned into mulch used for flower beds.
The Trump Organization also has found other ways to make money from the Bedminster property. The three siblings joined their father this past weekend in welcoming players to the controversial LIV Golf Invitational Series, which was financially backed by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.
Trump refused to answer reporters’ questions about how much he and the Trump Organization were paid to host the tournament, the Washington Post said. Trump and his family faced criticism from survivors of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and their family members for hosting the tournament just 50 miles from Ground Zero. An organization representing survivors and family members has raised questions about whether any Saudi officials had a role in the 2001 attacks.
