This is the rich dad radio show.
The good news and bad news about
money. Here's Robert Kiyosaki.
Hello? Hello. Hello, Robert
Kiyosaki, the rich dad radio show,
the good news and bad news about money.
And we have a very interesting
program for you today.
I have a dear long time
friend. I, you know,
Kevin and I have watched him grow
up and we're going to be talking
about what it's really like
to be part of the Trump family
and business. So Kim and
I have had the sincere,
I don't know what you call
it. It was an honor to,
for about eight years to
work behind the scenes with,
of course the Donald, the
company, Rona, Meredith,
Keith, Norma, and then
to really get to know them
as people and the two sons,
Don jr. And Eric and I
were politically incorrect.
We do the things that we shouldn't.
We're never going to say what I do,
but I've got to know
these guys. You know, we,
we spent a lot of time on this
deserted Island and the Hawaiian
Island chain. And it is in my opinion,
the most beautiful, the most
beautiful beaches on earth.
Only one problem, no water, no toilets,
no hotels and so we couldn't have
gotten so Don and Eric and I,
we could not have gotten as far away from
New York city as possible and to live
in paradise without the facilities.
So you get to know these,
the family very, very, very well.
And it really pisses me off to
see them under attack by the
opponents and it comments.
Thrilled to have Trump on the show. And
it's been quite awhile since I spoken.
And, uh, yeah, I, you know, I, I just,
people ask me about, um,
Donald Trump and what word
do I use to describe him?
And the word actually that comes
to mind is, is respectful. Um,
as I known Donald, he treated
people in his company.
He treats people,
strangers that he doesn't know what
we've done together with Robert,
Donald we're talking together.
He would be of the utmost respect
of people with their questions.
And he was very generous
with his information. Um,
and that then meeting Don jr,
and Eric and Ivanka a little bit.
Um, boy, what a, what a, what a
strong, solid, wonderful family.
So it's wonderful to reconnect with Eric
and I can't wait to find out all that's
going on since all the elections
and just know, uh, Eric,
you've got our full support
in this, in this battle.
So, so this, so one last thing
is this is personal for me,
is that my dad poor dad.
He was a political animal.
He liked politics. The trouble
was, he was a Democrat in Hawaii.
And when he saw the
corruption of the Democrats,
not the Republicans weren't corrupt,
but once he saw the corruption,
because he was part of the
governor of Hawaii staff,
when he saw the corruption and
crime, my father sweat sites.
So he went from Democrat
to Republican and he ran
for Lieutenant governor.
And in the let's say the election
was in November three months later,
my mother died
and the ration she died
is that battle politics
is the nastiest game I've ever seen.
And my mother couldn't take it because
when she shifted from Democrat to
Republican her best friends,
wouldn't talk to her anymore.
And so a few months later she was
dead. I went home for Christmas,
Christmas leave, I was
flight school in Florida.
So I saw her at Christmas and
she was dead a few days later.
So when I watched Don
and Don and Ivanka and
Eric and their dad, and Malania on stage,
I think of the family.
So really with that,
I like to just have insights on what
it's like to be a Trump. You know,
Kim and I speak from eight years of
experience of working with him. And I,
I would agree 100% with Kim,
the most respectful people
I've ever done business with.
So welcome to the program,
my friend, Eric Trump.
Welcome. Well, Hey guys. Thank you. Thank
you, cam. And thank you, Robert. And,
um, you know, you, two are two people.
I, I love to death, you know, this, um,
I don't need to tell you this and I have
so much respect for you and, you know,
it's got funny. We came into, you know,
our friendships maybe a little bit
later, but I remember, you know,
reading rich dad, poor
dad cover to cover. Um,
actually when I was at Georgetown,
um, coming out of Georgetown and it,
the parallels of that book in a
certain crazy way to my own life.
And I know you're probably rolling
your eyes right now, as I say that, um,
we're, we're almost profound and, and,
and it moved me the way many books have
been moved me and, and I'm, you know,
on one side I had, you
know, Donald Trump, right?
He was a billionaire real estate
developer in New York. Um,
at the same time I had my mother's
family and they were from coming to
Czechoslovakia at the
time. And I was, you know,
Donnie walk and I would go over
there for a month or two, a summers.
And my parents really believed in this
and wanted to get us the hell out of New
York city, um, away from
people. Um, and, uh,
they wanted to get us and that's kind
of a different world and different
environment, um, environment that didn't
hamper kids, an environment where, um,
you know, you didn't have
16 year old kids, you know,
wealthy kids driving around
in Lamborghinis and being
spoiled, rotten. And, um,
you know, where you had people
who work incredibly hard, um,
from a very young age and there was no
nonsense and there's no BS. And, um,
so in, in many ways I kind of parallel
the two families, um, you know,
Robert that you did so good at talking,
you know, in, in, in, in a way we,
we kind of understood the very
blue collar lifestyle, um,
that my grandparents lived in. And again,
a communist country where you didn't
have the luxuries that, you know,
you had in the United States of America,
you didn't even have close to luxury.
So you had in the United
States of America, um,
at the same time we come back to
America and we'd see kind of a totally
different world. And, um, and a,
you've always done such kind of a great
job telling that story. And, you know,
maybe, maybe now, and I know you've
told me about your father before,
but you know, we also have that Arlo
where I guess, you know, our fathers,
you know, I went into politics and,
you know, did well in politics.
And you also see the
nastiness of that world. And,
and I can tell you that certainly is
a, you know, nasty world, but, um,
you know, in life, you know, whether
it's business, um, certainly in business,
you've got to fight from
things you believe in.
You've got to fight for those
that you believe in. And, um,
you've always got to do the
right things and, um, you know,
the world can be a nasty place and it
can be a nasty place and in business and
in life and in politics.
And, um, you know,
you've got to always have an
iron shield up and, um, you know,
you've got to be immensely loyal
to the people who are loyal to you,
and you've got to fight for the
things that are right. And just,
and true when I'm righteous.
And, um, you know,
I feel like we do that every day.
Well, you know,
that's why that's really what we wanted
to talk about is you standing up,
but also I'd like to ask him to
share what it was like is your role
model you love was Norma, and then
you met Rohan I and Meredith. And
so we got to meet
the family plus the business
they're the same, right?
They, they were exactly the same.
And it's funny just very quickly, um,
both Robert and I read the book art of
the deal that was like our inspiration.
This was before we were
investing in real estate.
Robert had done some investing before
that, but we read art of the deal.
We went to New York city, we went
to a woman's rink where, where,
where Donald Trump had resurrected it.
And when we went to New York and
Robert said, I'm really someday,
I'd really like to meet Donald.
Or it was when we were actually walking
to do the book deal with Donald. And,
and Robert said, I'm looking forward
to meeting Donald Trump. And I said,
I want to meet Norma. And Norma was
Donald's right. Hand person. Right.
I've been with the family for many,
many years. Um, and just seemed from,
just seem to be such a
powerhouse and such a confident,
incredibly brilliant woman. Yeah.
And I did meet her and she
was all of those things. Um,
so it's go ahead.
So, so Norma was my father's
assistant for, um, you know,
30 years and she was an amazing woman.
She passed away few years ago when I met,
she was just an unbelievable, I mean,
she was tough and elegant and, um,
glamorous all at the same.
It was kind of this unique personality
that you just don't see all the time.
I mean, she would never say
a bad word. She would never,
but she would never get pushed around.
She did everything with
grace and elegance is smart,
and she was just an amazing woman.
She was, uh, she was almost, you know,
a second mom in a certain way,
um, to me and you know, my father,
and I've told this story that with you,
with both of you before, but my father,
the one thing that he insisted on is
that we worked from a very young age and,
you know, so I worked on construction
sites. I worked, you know,
with the plumbers and electricians and
HVAC guys. And, um, you know, and, and I,
you know,
I was running backhoes and chainsaws
and everything at a very young age.
He put us on construction sites and
he made us work. We tile. And I mean,
just about every trade you, you could
possibly imagine. And, you know, at 11,
12 years old and, um, you know, sometimes
I'd go to, for her first, I'd go to,
you know, Norma first and try
to negotiate my, and by the way,
this was like below minimum
wage at the time. Right.
And then my father's theory was always,
you know, if you're a young kid,
you work hard, you will, you will learn
the value of a dollar. Um, you know,
you get paid minimum wage or below
when you learn a skillset and
by, you know, four or five o'clock
in the afternoon, you're exhausted.
So you can't get into
trouble in other ways,
and you fall asleep early and guess
what? He can do it again. And it's,
it's really kind of instilled so
much of kind of who I am today,
but I'd often go try and
negotiate my, you know,
$4 and 25 cents or whatever it
was with, with Norma. And at one,
one day I finally said,
you know what, honestly,
I'm just going to go right to the source
because you're probably tougher than he
is, but she was just, she's
an amazing woman. And, um,
we have those across the company. I mean,
it's, it's the only thing, you know,
we love doing the apprentice guys, but
the only thing that the apprentice did,
um, negatively, um, for all the
positives as much fun as it was,
and as successful as who was,
we ran it for almost 15 seasons.
It was the number one show, but everybody
literally would come up to me. Wow.
You guys are crazy. You fire
people all the time and I'm, I'm,
I'm literally laughing and you guys
would laugh if you heard that comment,
because if you look across
our organization, I mean,
I'm looking at somebody right
outside my office, as we speak,
who's been with us for 25
years. Um, you know, and,
and they're just a person who happens
to be literally in the hallway right now
that I'm looking at,
but you look across our company and
everybody's been here for 20 years,
25 years, 30 years, you know, four years
in many cases. I mean, these aren't,
these aren't numbers, they're,
they're, they're lifers. And, you know,
I always say, if somebody makes it past
the first year, they'll be with us,
um, you know, for, for a lifetime.
And we treat them like
family and they are family,
and we would do anything for them and
they would do anything for us. And, um,
and we just don't have turnover. And
I think it speaks a lot to the family.
I think it's the streets. It's a
lot to how we treat people. And, um,
I think frankly,
it's probably the number one aspect to
the success of our company over those
years. It's kind of the continuity
of just incredible people,
all fighting for the same
cause and objectives.
And it was extremely kind
and respectful like Kim, Oh,
is your experience cell
Norma was replaced by a Rona.
And then we may Meredith who
was Donald's PR person while I
was, and that was like, we're the
best of friends. Right. I mean,
it was just the best relationship.
Yeah. And, and, and, and Meredith.
Is with us today. And Rona is with
us today and Nina, those people,
those people haven't changed. And you,
here we are, um, you know, um, you know,
through four years of,
of, of, uh, you know,
craziness and campaigns and this and
them, and, you know, they're still,
you know, with the company, you know,
right now. And it's, it's, you know,
we are truly, truly blessed. And, um,
I can tell you in the
hospitality industry,
the hospitality is an
interesting industry.
We have a lot of people move around
and, you know, people go to hotel for,
you know, a year or two,
and then they'll move to another hotel
and they'll move to another hotel. Right.
I mean, there's, you know, 10 year
typically in the hospitality industry,
isn't that long. And if you
look across our properties,
you look at our general managers. I
mean, every single one of them have been,
you know, we have a, we have
an unbelievable building.
You both know what you stayed there
before in Las Vegas, it's 1,282 rooms,
right on the strip in Las Vegas.
It's an unbelievable building, um,
unbelievable hotel and
our general manager. Um,
Brian used to literally
drive us to school.
He started off as a driver in the company,
and he's one of these guys and
it's actually a great life lesson.
And I tell this story a lot, but he
always had his hand up, you know, um,
you know, bosses or
anything I can do for you.
And so when we started building
Las Vegas, you know, Brian,
do you mind taking a couple of
architects out there, you know,
showing them the site, showing
them around. And he did that.
He came back bosses or anything
else I can do. Well, you know, um,
we need a couple of bankers to see
the site. We bring them out there.
No problem. You know, so we know, you
know, a couple of months later, you know,
Brian, do you mind going out to Las
Vegas and lining up some contractors?
You know, here are the guys I want
you to talk to go out there. You know,
sure enough, Brian should enough
was running comp you know,
construction and put the
building on time and on schedule.
And was the first person worked in the
morning, was last person to leave. Um,
you know, had great personal
skills. Everybody loved him.
He could motivate people. He always
got things done. He was super reliable.
He never let you down. And so sure
enough, when we opened the building,
we will tell you which hotel company,
but we brought in a general manager for
one of these fancy hotel companies. And,
you know, the person comes in with a
three piece suit and the pocket squares,
and, you know, the person
will come in and you know,
that block in the morning and leave at
three o'clock in the afternoon. And,
you know,
after a couple of months we realized that
this whole thing wasn't gonna work out
and, you know, so that's what, you know,
Brian had his hand up
again and be like, listen,
I know nothing about running
hotels, but I'll figure it out.
And I'm gonna do a damn
good job. And, you know,
12 years later Brian's running
that same hotel and it's, you know,
one of the most successful and profitable
hotels in Las Vegas. And, and, um,
those are the types of people that we
surround ourselves with guys, if they're,
they're unbelievable people, and it's
not about the Ivy league education,
it's not about the, you know, it's,
it's people who care and will fight and,
and who are loyal, um, and, and
always have their hand up and, um,
and always get results. Um, you know,
that's what my father has always
cared about. And frankly, um,
and I don't want to bring
politics, but, you know, and he's,
he's seemed to this day, I mean, loyalty's
really everything. And, um, and, um,
you know,
results are really everything and it
doesn't matter who you are or what you do.
Um, you know, if you work
harder, um, if you're smarter,
if you're more motivated, um, you know,
those are the people that succeed in life.
So, so Eric, Eric to that,
Eric, to that point, you know,
that you're in the hospitality business.
And I know our listeners would
love to hear how you look at
business today, given the whole
craziness that's going on. What do you,
what do you see? How do you think,
what are you looking towards
in terms of business?
Well, you know, is it 2019 was probably
the best year in the history of, um,
of company. I mean,
we just had an unbelievable year and
the hotels are killing it. And I'm,
you know, I think we do
hospitality better than anybody.
You have so many management companies
out there and that's what they do.
They just manage, right. They don't own
assets and they sit there and they take,
you know, 2% of gross and they manage
a whole hotel and, and they don't care.
They care about operating
to their, you know,
brand standards and they don't actually
care about bottom line. And, and, um,
it's actually really the fault
of the hospitality industry.
You have so many big box players who don't
want to own a piece of land that just
want to take fees off of gross revenue,
and they don't care about the rest. And,
um, you know, we're very different
and we own the land. We, you know,
most cases, we, we, we operate, you know,
the buildings we build the buildings,
um, you know, so we really
handle every aspect of it.
And then we own them
longterm and, you know, so,
so the people in those buildings really
become, you know, friends of ours. And,
um, and again, they're with
they're with us forever,
and it's why we do kind of hospitality
very, very differently. Um,
but 2019 was an amazing year golf
hotels, commercial buildings, retail,
residential, um, you know,
our winery was, you know,
is off the charts and obviously COVID
throws a monkey wrench into things.
We have a unbelievable hotel in Waikiki.
Um, you both know very well, Waikiki,
Hawaii, and, um, you know,
guess what, um, you know,
I've had visitors there until, um,
right now the governor just
moved it back to September 1st.
And I don't blame anybody for doing
that. I mean, there's a pandemic,
that's rock this world in ways that, um,
no one can quite fathom. Um, in fact,
I had recently had a friend that
passed away from it. You know,
somebody that was my age it's it's, um,
it's, it's truly horrible. The way this,
this kind of viruses has rocked
the world and, um, you know,
state to have to react differently. And,
um, it's hard, a lot of businesses, um,
across the board. Now we're very,
very fortunate that we're a company that
believes in having very little debt,
um, because we're just a
mature company. You know,
when you first get into development,
guess what? You need a lot of debt.
Otherwise, you're just never going to
make it. And you're never going to,
you know, you have to have leverage
and you have to use leverage.
And Robert you've probably talked about
this subject better than anybody in the
world. Um,
we're at a different point where we
believe in having very little leverage,
but that's because we have a lot
of properties and tremendous flow.
May I interrupt something because
I just want to get into what I saw.
I grew up in Hawaii, like you said,
and this guy named will Obama
is from Hawaii. Alright.
And I'm not going to say
anything more than that,
but it's a Democrat
and I've seen his house
you know because when he was not there,
my friend managed the property and
I got to go and say, wow, that's,
this is how the president
of the United States lives.
And I've also been inside
your home in Trump tower.
There's a difference.
And I've also been because of you
at once your wedding at Mara Lago,
there's a difference.
And I wish people could see the difference
between the Trump residents
is not that that's.
But I, I immediately, because
I understand real estate,
you guys are financing that
because it's commercial property,
Obama is residential. The whole,
the numbers skew, everything skews.
So anyway that's really what I, you know,
there was the insights I gained and,
you know, Maralago, I
remember it was your wedding.
I mean, those bloody shrimps
look like lobsters. I mean,
I never seen such big shrimp
in my life and I'm an adult.
We
do a very, very good job running
those properties. And as you said,
there are commercial properties.
Sometimes it's interesting how some of
these politicians buy $20 million houses
about three days after they come
out of politics. But I digress.
Eric, we've got to take a
break, but Obama bought three,
but he bought three residences that
were not commercial properties.
And really that's the deference. That,
that is kind of an insight I have as
getting to having the honor to hang out
with you guys. So we come back,
we'll be going more into what
it's like to be a Trump, you know,
and you know, Kim said it is the best
word. They treat everybody with respect.
We'll be right back. Welcome back.
Robert Kiyosaki, the rich dad radio show,
the good news and bad news about money.
You can listen to the rich
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go to a rich dad,
radio.com and our guest
today is a long time friend.
We've watched him grow up. I
don't get there anyway, but his,
the Trump's Eric Trump and the
Trump family, the Trump business,
and Tim and I for eight years had the
privilege and honor of actually hanging
out with him. I mean, Eric,
Don and I have spent time on the
most beautiful beaches in Hawaii,
but there was no water, no shelter,
no toilets, no Cox, nothing.
And you got to know a guy after
three, three days of stinky stuff.
You know that these guys are not wimps,
Don and Eric are not wimps.
They're really the best young men.
And Kim got to know the staff. I mean,
they're just the most respectful
people. Every time you walked in,
we could walk into the Donald's
office and he was always respectful.
So when we see him attacked
on the show on, in politics,
I got a little crazy because it brings
back memories of my dad who was a
Democrat shift, the Republican, he
ran for Lieutenant governor of Hawaii.
And three months later, my mother
was dead. It is such a nasty game.
So I take it personally when I
say my friends and family and
attacked by the media and it comments Kim.
Well, I like what Eric, what you said
in the, in the first part of the show,
um,
your mom's side of the family
really wanted to teach you
the values of hard work
and, um, not, not having the
privilege of money and all of that.
I thought, I mean, that
really did. I would love for,
I would love every parent to hear this
show and hear you say that because I
think it's so important. And
I just wanted to follow up.
The thing I want to say. I didn't,
I didn't really know these
guys and we're running,
we're in Hawaii and we're in the car
together. And Don and Eric are in the car.
We're driving to the helicopter pad.
So we can go to this deserted
Island with nothing and they're
texting their sister and I'm like,
uh, what are you guys doing? Well?
So Don jr says, while she can't cook.
So Don and Eric were texting Ivanka
recipes because she had a new
boyfriend. I don't know if it's Jarrett,
but she had a new.
No, it was there. Yeah.
You guys can cook too. Oh yeah.
It said our mother and our grand that
we did when we're not spoiled. We did.
I remember exactly what you said
to me. My parents had servants.
We did not. Is that correct, Eric?
Yeah. No, that's, that's, that's that's
correct. I mean, listen, we lived,
we obviously guys lived a very
privileged school life. We just,
my parents were smart enough to, and
we never ran away from that. I mean,
we always had a, a warm house and a
warm roof over the head and we always,
you know, we, we, we lived so, you know,
um, unbelievably beautiful lives. Um,
my parents were smart enough to also
show us kind of the flip side to that
again. And it's, it's not that my
parents, my grandparents, um, they,
how many checks pocket and didn't,
didn't have a, you know, um, you know,
wonderful lives intact, you know, I could,
I could probably make the argument
guys sometimes, um, you know,
maybe they live more wonderful lives
and happier lives and you know,
many of the very wealthy, miserable
people that you see that, you know,
often run around, right.
And, and Robert came,
you certainly know plenty of them.
And there there's plenty
who are incredible people.
Right. But, but you know,
our parents wanted to show us kind
of both sides of that equation.
And that's why, you know,
that we spent a lot of time
in Czechoslovakia back in
the days, you know, um,
you know, before the wall fell and, um,
you know, very, very different it's, um,
you know, you, weren't eating
fruit every single day.
You didn't have the luxury of
having iPads and movies, you know,
what you went outside
and, you know, you, you,
you built up a little
fire or you, um, you know,
went and played in the woods and
built a Slingshot or, you know,
whatever you did, you, you,
you made up games for yourself to play
because you didn't have X-Box and you
didn't have buy phones and you
didn't have iPads. And, um,
but my parents were very, very
smart and, you know, so, you know,
we saw both sides of the coin
and I think that's really, um,
one of the things that
served me incredibly well
in life, you know, we were,
we were sheltered in a
certain way, but we were,
and we were spoiled in a certain way
clearly. Um, we went to the best schools,
but we just,
we got to see the opposite side of the
coin and that very much grounded us.
We saw how real people lived in
concrete as I faced hardship, um,
with a lot, not a lot of means.
And, um, and, um, and that,
you know, what,
those people are incredible people and
they're happy people and they love life
and they love family. And it was, um,
it was an unbelievable balance that
they were able to strike. And I, again,
I think that's probably very similar,
um, to the very life you lived. Right.
Well, the other thing is,
but you can, the proof,
the proof of the parents
is in the children.
And I see some really
rotten kids these days,
but some are gonna have one more story.
I remember it was you and I, and, uh,
Don were upstate New York and I don't
know aware of the heck way world,
but it was remote.
And you guys drive into this
little delicatessen owned by
Hispanics and you and Don were the most
respectful, I mean, far beyond me. And I,
I watched that and I've, it was
humbling. And I've, I picked up.
What's that part of having that check
mother, if she had a, she had a, uh,
she was tough. I mean, she was,
she was tough and, you know,
you crossed her or you weren't polite
and you didn't open the door or you, um,
you know, didn't respect an elder
or guess what it's it's. I would,
I would argue that some of the behavior
back then would be child abuse today,
but it was, it was, it was great.
And it was great for us and our pants
were down and our butts were black and
blue and you know, what, we
deserved it. And, um, you know,
I thank God every single day
that she, um, you know, she was,
she was a tough cookie
and, um, you know, she was,
she was amazing and she was elegant and
she's beautiful. And she was smart. Um,
you know,
and you treated her with respect and
you ate the food on your plate and you
didn't waste food. And again, you
opened doors and you said, please,
and thank you. And, um, by the
way, if you crossed, you know,
if you crossed Ivana, if you
crossed my mom, I mean, it was a,
you were in serious trouble. And, um,
and I think that, that's why, I mean,
we really just, we had to be
between her and my father,
we had unbelievable role models,
our lives and people that expected
you to work hard and achieve. And,
um, and, um, you know,
didn't spoil us and didn't give us a
hundreds and hundreds of dollars allowance
every single week to do
absolutely. And spend it on,
on bad habits that ultimately probably
took down a lot of people that,
you know, I know people were
friends of mine. I mean,
it's one of the reasons we never fell
into drinking and drugs because then we
just, we went out and we worked for
the money that we had and guess what,
we didn't want to spend that on
unhealthy novelties. And, um, and I,
I respect them tremendously
for the way they brought us up.
Eric in the first, in the
first, in the first, um, yeah,
in the first section we were talking
about how you look at business from,
uh, what's going on today.
Cause I know our listeners are really
interested in hearing your point of view
of what you see today and what
you see coming in the future.
Could you share your mindset with that?
Sure. Yeah. So I started saying, you know,
2019 was an amazing year for us
illicit 2020. It's just, you know,
the whole world was Delta,
you know, um, a set of cards.
And so certain businesses that we
have are off the charts. Um, you know,
we have a great winery with the largest
winery on East coast of the United
States. And, um, you know, it's funny
your, your, your wholesale business,
which largely caters to restaurants. Um,
obviously that falls to almost nothing.
So, you know, every restaurant in the
country is, is shut, right. And, but yet,
you know, you have to figure out and like
sometimes how to retool very quickly.
And so guess what, we went to a e-commerce
model and our e-commerce went to,
you know, it's probably a 500%, um,
this year really, you know, selling,
selling wine wine online because people
are home. People are cooking at home,
people are eating at home and we were
able to retool our business in a couple of
days. And, um, and quite frankly,
the margin actually often econ was
substantially better than going through,
you know, three different
distributors and this and that.
And it was actually kind of
a net positive. Um, golf was,
was great positive for
us because guess what,
it was kind of the last to close that
was the first open and it was outside and
it was considered safe. Um, and so
you, our golf business this year is,
is off the charts. Um, on
the flip side, um, you know,
naturally we have city hotels, um,
you know, all over the concrete, um,
that are, are generally closed
just because of, you know,
social distancing and
people aren't traveling.
And airline lift is at 10% of what it was
in February and now that's coming back
very strong and we're starting to
see the numbers really pick up.
And I think we're going to have a great
kind of, you know, um, third quarter,
fourth quarter. And I think next
year is going to be, you know,
back to normal or back to beyond normal,
unless something silly happens where,
you know, Democrats are raising
taxes and, um, you know,
try and kill the economy. But, um, listen,
the whole world had to learn how to adapt
and everybody had to change their, um,
business philosophies.
And, um, and, and again,
when you're told in the case of Las Vegas,
guess what you have 24 hours at close
to 1200 room hotel. Um, you know,
that certainly hurts.
Um, at the same time,
we always had a philosophy as
a family, which was, you know,
always maintained that, that
umbrella for a rainy day.
We had that in Perella
and we were, um, we,
we we've always maintained a low
leverage and we've been very,
very financially prudent and we were
smart and we reacted quickly and
we did the right thing. And,
um, and so, um, you know,
2020 will not be, um, the year. I,
I want to remember the most, um,
by any means, at least not the first half
of 2020, um, at the same time, we're,
we're,
we're incredibly blessed to have a strong
company we're incredibly blessed to
have incredible cashflow, a little
leverage, unbelievable people,
the best assets. Um, and
sometimes you have to roll with.
I think, what, what Kim was impressed,
said you had 24 hours to
shutdown a 1200 room hotel.
No, we had, we had this problem
all over, um, where, you know,
you get call from some, you know,
state officials, some governor, um,
some mayor and, um, you
know, um, congratulations,
you have 24 hours to show to at 1,283,
82 room hotel in Las
Vegas. And it's like, well,
what about the many guests
that are staying there? Well,
they're going to check out and okay,
what about, you know, 700 people,
a person team that you
have? Well, you know,
we're not really sure what to tell you
when, but obviously stay had to do that.
Um,
States had to do that to get in front
of the virus and the federal government
had to issue a lot of mandates,
but for the business community,
I'm going to share so many of the
people listed on the phone, you know,
who all face your own challenges. It
wasn't, it wasn't an easy thing. And,
you know, in many cases where you
have it, you'd have a, you know,
a governor of a state saying you have
to close and then you'd have a mayor of
respect to town saying, no, you have to
stay open. And, um, you know, and, and,
and that's no fault of anybody
to tell you the truth. It was,
you were dealing with an unprecedented
situation that was incredibly difficult.
And I think the business
community learned a lot. Um,
I think the business community through
this whole thing has become more tech
savvy. Um, all of a sudden, you, weren't
doing 10 in person meeting today,
and you were doing a
lot of zoom calls. Um,
there might be things that actually come
out of COVID longterm it's as much pain
and cost is. It's, um, really
hit everybody with their,
there are probably things longterm, um,
that has taught everybody, um, you know,
probably the need for that rainy day
fund. Um, probably the need to, to always,
you know, maintain
reserves where you can, um,
and be especially financially prudent
because people saw the world turned from
that the greatest economy in the
world with absolutely no waves
or dark clouds on the
horizon, on any front, two,
all of a sudden of Iris coming from
another country unexpectedly. Um,
I'm gonna go there cause really,
uh, you know, one 80, um,
in terms of the way people operate. But
again, longterm, I think, you know, um,
they've made people, um, in
certain ways more efficient, um,
it's made them less reliant on, on
uncertain things. Um, and, um, I,
I think it's taught the business
community a tremendous deal.
So in closing, you can get
political here cause, um,
anything you want to say, you
know, you can trash the Democrats.
I don't really care, not
political here, but, uh,
and any challenges or anything you would
like to talk about probably from your
father's point of view?
Yeah. Like what do people need to Eric?
I think, um, I think you can
turn on the TV and, and, um, uh,
w what surprised me
maybe, you know, without,
and maybe I'll get political
for a second, but, you know,
and I'll try to get away from it, but,
but I have to tell you that, you know,
um, we came out of a world that was
fairly cutthroat, which is, you know,
it's kind of the business world
and nothing can compare, you know,
nothing can prepare you for what,
you know, kind of the savages, uh,
in Washington DC, um, act
like, speak like work.
Like, I mean,
it's just that the evilness to sometimes
it exists and in that city is unlike
anything I've ever seen before.
And, you know, Robert and business,
it seems like you're gonna have two
people who are on totally opposite ends of
the spectrum. Let's take, um, you know,
a Chuck Schumer and let's
take a Ted Cruz, right.
They might be on totally
opposite ends of the spectrum,
but in New York city or in
Arizona or anywhere else,
those two can be best friends.
Um, because, you know,
they want to create a great company
and they want to create the next great
widget and they might have
different political sources,
right. But they're just,
you know, they're,
they're trying to create
a goal of creating a great
company or a great product.
Um, you know, in, in, in government
is very different, right? Power,
power tends to corrupt politicians.
And these politicians who have been
in Congress for 36 years, 40 years,
they've never had a job in their life.
All they care about is having that
beautiful white marble office,
looking over looking Pennsylvania
Avenue. And, you know,
when you see some of these proposals,
some of the proposals in Washington, DC,
don't, they don't benefit the American
people. And, and, you know, you see this,
the lack of law and order,
you see this, um, you know,
let's go defund the police. You know, the,
some of the bravest men and women in
the world, let's take everybody's taxes,
let's raise everybody's
taxes by 85%. I mean,
Biden's proposal literally
increases people's taxes by 82%.
Every business in this
country will be bankrupted.
Every small business in this country
will be bankrupted and people will be
taking home tens of thousands of dollars
less every year for the same amount of
work that our economy will come to a
screeching halt. And, and you know,
this is a guy who's been Washington
for 40, you know, 40 plus years.
I think it's 48 years between being in
the Senate and then vice president and
everything else. And, you know, he's
never had to balance a checkbook.
He's never had to sign
the front of a check.
He's always signed the back of a check.
He's never signed the front of the
check. He's never had the struggles,
you know, Robert Kim that you
guys have had, or, you know,
the sleepless nights that we've all had
before. Right. It's not what they do.
They.
Eric, Eric, let me interrupt you.
Did you go to the Ukraine and did your
father say they should pay you money like
Biden did with his son?
No, I didn't. And by the way, if I took
one quarter from any foreign government,
guess what I'd be in, I'd be in
jail. And then you have, you know,
a hundred by him getting
millions of dollars to sit on boards of
small energy companies. I mean, it it's,
it's, I mean, it's really unbelievable.
He's getting paid $600,000 a year to sit
on a board of a small energy company.
If you look at the board members
of Exxon Mobil, Exxon Mobil,
the largest energy companies in the world,
the average board member
gets paid $300,000,
but Hunter Biden who
kicked out of the Navy, um,
certainly had lots of problems with the
small little energy company in the crane
that no one's ever heard. I was getting
paid 600,000. I mean, why do you,
why does any person with a rational
mind think that that's that's happening?
And there's only one reason,
and everybody knows exactly what it is
or flying over to China on air force two
with his father and taking $1.5 billion
out of the company I got out of the
country. I mean, we know some of
the greatest investors in the world,
the heads of, you know,
BlackRock and this and that they can't
get 2 cents out of China. Um, you know,
yet Hunter,
Biden's able to fly over there for 30
minute meeting and take home $1.5 billion,
right? It's guys, it's the
epitome of, of, of corruption.
If we did that on our end to the
magnitude of one quarter, um,
we'd be in jail for the
rest of our lives. Now,
the reason my father got into the Spino
politics was to save this country. Um,
certainly not for my financial
benefit and believe me, it's,
it's cost him billions of dollars for
meaning politics has cost them billions
and millions of dollars in terms
of lost revenue, lost opportunity,
lost other things.
And he doesn't care because he's doing
the right thing and he doesn't, you know,
he doesn't frankly need it,
but maybe you see so many other people
who come out of politics and guess what,
they're worth $50 million. Where did that
money come from? If they're getting a,
you know, a government salary of $140,000
a year, or whatever the, you know,
you know, how do you,
how do you buy that house in Martha's
vineyard and a house in Hawaii and the
house in Washington, DC? How do you,
how do you buy all these properties that
aren't a revenue producing that don't
throw off any cash flow and, you know,
people really need to start asking that
question because it's, um, you know,
Washington's a very interesting
place and there's tremendous. Um,
there's tremendous corruption.
I think my father's greatest legacy will
hopefully be exposing much of that. Um,
and frankly, this is honesty as a
media, but to the, uh, the entire world.
Yeah. I would love, I would
love to see that Eric,
I would love to see that
exposed. I would love that.
That's my, that's my dream.
Yeah.
Thank you. Thank you.
This swamp is deep and there's lots
of alligators, but he's working on it.
I'm glad we ended offspring
Eric Trump jr.
Eric Trump, to get to
know you and your family.
Uh, I just, I appreciate all you're
doing Eric. And again, you know,
you have our support and if that truly
what you just said there at the end of
exposing and bringing the truth to
what's happening is really, I would,
I would jump on that site all day long.
So if I can be of any assistance
you reach out, please.
Excellent. Okay. Anyway. Well,
thank Eric. We got cut off earlier,
but I tell you what, if you really
want to see the difference in parents?
Just look at Hunter Biden and Don
jr. Eric Trump and Ivanka Trump.
Thank you very much. So we
lost Eric Trump right there,
but I think it was a fantastic show.
I think you get the point. You have,
I'm not, we're not political by which
us looking at the different offspring.
And you can say, you know,
how the Biden kids make their money
and the Trump kids make their money.
It's a little bit different.
And any final words are Kim?
Well, I just, you know, he said, Derek
said so many important things. And, uh,
one of the, a couple of things
that he said is, you know,
with this whole COVID thing that he sees
that there's going to be positives out
of it, you know, the reserves rainy
day funds technology. Um, I love that.
But the other thing that he said,
which I thought was really important is
for any entrepreneur is when this struck
like in Vegas, you know,
it was the resiliency,
the resiliency of how do
we do things differently?
Like the winery he talked about,
they went right to e-commerce
and they're doing great.
I look at the rich dad
company and, you know,
we've all been working from home
and we got this office building.
And so we're like, well,
what can we do with the office building
if we don't need to be here all the time
and what we can turn it into
a warehouse for our products.
So it's like that resiliency. How
do you think differently? And,
and that's what makes him and the
whole Trump family so successful.
I think that's less the upbringing and
really the strong values that they have.
So I'll just end with, this
is like. I said, you know,
I've spent so many hours and days
with 'em on this beautiful, the most,
the most beautiful beaches in the world.
I've seen a lot of beautiful beaches,
no toilets, no cook, no
chef, no nothing, no showers.
And where that got this fire
where stinky, you know, again,
to know Don jr and Eric. And at that time,
the Hottie of the day was Paris Hilton.
So I wanted to know the dirt
because Paris Hilton and Don jr.
And Ivanka and all that,
they all run around together.
So I remember asking those two boys
young man at the time I said, Tommy,
what do you know about Paris Hilton?
And otherwise I was asking him for the
dirt. And both of them looked up at me.
They said, I'm sorry. We don't
know you well enough yet. Yes,
they will.
I don't know you well enough yet. Yeah.
Yeah. But they don't
gossip it's it was ongoing.
Who are these guys? Do
you know what I mean?
The character that is instilled with
them is what their father and mother
did and their grandparents.
So I think if there was a lesson to be
learned here, politics is a nasty game.
I wouldn't believe a thing
you see on the press,
but just look at the young people coming
out of the families. So with that,
I want to thank you all for listening
to the rich dad radio show and go out
there and being calm people with better
character. We can always do that.
Thank you very much.
