Two killed after collision with truck on Hwy. 417 near Limoges, Ont.
Ontario Provincial Police say two people were killed after a car and a transport truck collided in the westbound lanes of Highway 417 near Limoges, Ont. on Tuesday afternoon.
Donald Trump's opulent hotel near the White House that drew lobbyists and diplomats seeking favour with the ex-president as well as criticism as a symbol of his ethics conflicts is being sold to a Miami investment group, according to published reports citing anonymous sources.
CGI Merchant Group agreed to pay the Trump Organization US$375 million for the rights to the 263-room hotel and has plans to rebrand it as a Waldorf Astoria, according to The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, citing sources with knowledge of the matter.
Neither the Trump Organization nor CGI responded to numerous requests for comment.
The deal is expected to close early next year after which the hotel will be managed by the Waldorf Astoria under a separate deal struck by CGI, according to the Journal. The Waldorf Astoria business is owned by Hilton Worldwide Holdings.
The hotel has been a big money loser for the Trump family since it won rights to convert a stately federal building called the Old Post Office from the federal government under a lease that, with extensions, can run nearly 100 years.
The federal agency that owns the property, the U.S. General Services Administration, must sign off on any sale.
The Trump Organization poured $200 million to convert it into a luxury hotel, opening its doors in late 2016, shortly before Trump became president. It then proceeded to lose more than $70 million over four years, according to audited reports obtained by a House committee investigating Trump's conflicts of interest with the business. The losses came even before the pandemic led to shutdowns, hammering the hotel industry.
Ethics experts urged Trump to sell the hotel and other business holdings before he took office, but Trump refused and the hotel soon became a magnet for the powerful and power seeking: Lobbyists for industries trying to shape policy, Republican politicians looking for a presidential imprimatur, and diplomats from Azerbaijan, the Philippines, Kuwait and other countries.
Looming over all the din in his glittering lobby was the question: How much were decisions made by Trump a few blocks away in the Oval Office being shaped by his financial interests and, even if not at all, why risk tarnishing U.S. policy with even the appearance of conflict?
Trump dismissed such worries, saying he was too busy with the business of governing to bother with making money off his office. The Trump Organization promised to send a check to the U.S. Treasury each year equivalent to profits from foreign government patrons, a response to criticisms he was violating the emoluments clause in the U.S. Constitution forbidding foreign government gifts.
"The Trump hotel DC stood as a bright neon sign telling foreign countries and moneyed interests how to bribe the president and a stark reminder to Americans that his decisions as president were just as likely to be about his bottom line as about our interests," said Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group. "Selling it now that he's out of office and the grift dried up is, to say the least, too little, too late."
The purchaser, CGI, manages $325 million from wealthy families, entertainers and sports figures, investing in office buildings and hotels among other kinds of property, according to its website. In addition, the firm partnered late last year with baseball star Alex Rodriguez and another investment firm to start a $650 million fund to buy hotels and convert them to Hilton brands.
CGI has also launched a chain of "socially conscious" hotels that donate to local charities, support local businesses and buy eco-friendly products. In September, it announced it would be opening a hotel in Miami with a glass-bottomed pool overlooking the Atlantic Ocean called the Gabriel South Beach as part of its socially conscious offerings. The hotel will be part of the Curio Collection, a Hilton chain.
The head of the firm, Jamaican-born Raoul Thomas, has donated heavily to Democratic party politicians, including the Joe Biden's campaign. He is a senior board member of National Association of Black Hotel Owners. His firm has invested $30 million in Morris Brown College in Atlanta for a hotel and hospitality training program at the historically Black institution in Atlanta.
It's not clear how much money the Trump family is making from the sale given that terms of the deal have not been disclosed. Sales of hotels sometimes include "earn outs" in which the seller is only handed all the money promised if the buyer hits certain financial goals in the years after the deal closes.
The Trump family was originally hoping to get $500 million for the hotel when it first put it on the market in the fall of 2019. It was pulled off the market, then put back on this year.
A few hotel experts were surprised by the reported deal price given how few businessmen, tourists and lobbyists are coming to Washington.
Bill Collins, an executive vice chair at commercial real estate broker Cushman Wakefield, said a price equivalent to $1 million for each room is "top dollar" in the industry. By that rough valuation, the Trump hotel would be worth no more than $263 million, nearly $100 million less than it reportedly got.
"They put too much money into it and couldn't drive up the occupancy," he told the AP last month. "Can someone manage it better? Maybe, but only marginally."
Ontario Provincial Police say two people were killed after a car and a transport truck collided in the westbound lanes of Highway 417 near Limoges, Ont. on Tuesday afternoon.
High waters flooded neighborhoods around Houston on Saturday following heavy rains that have already resulted in crews rescuing hundreds of people from homes, rooftops and roads engulfed in murky water.
As Wegovy becomes available to Canadians starting Monday, a medical expert is cautioning patients wanting to use the drug to lose weight that no medication is a ''magic bullet,' and the new medication is meant particularly for people who meet certain criteria related to obesity and weight.
A U.S. farmworker who caught bird flu after working with dairy cattle in Texas appears to be the first known case of mammal-to-human transmission of the virus, a new study shows.
Electric scooters (e-scooters) have been gaining popularity in the capital and this season comes with some changes and updates.
Crucial witnesses took the stand in the second week of testimony in Donald Trump's hush money trial, including a California lawyer who negotiated deals at the center of the case and a longtime adviser to the former president.
A Chinese truck driver was praised in local media Saturday for parking his vehicle across a highway and preventing more cars from tumbling down a slope after a section of the road in the country's mountainous south collapsed and killed at least 48 people.
A 60-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman killed in a wrong-way crash on Highway 401 earlier this week have been identified by the Consulate General of India in Toronto.
Montreal's Felix Auger-Aliassime has advanced to his first ATP Masters final, and he hasn't had to play all that much tennis to do it.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.
Police in Oak Bay, B.C., had to close a stretch of road Sunday to help an elephant seal named Emerson get safely back into the water.
Out of more than 9,000 entries from over 2,000 breweries in 50 countries, a handful of B.C. brews landed on the podium at the World Beer Cup this week.
Raneem, 10, lives with a neurological condition and liver disease and needs Cholbam, a medication, for a longer and healthier life.