CNN Panel Clashes Over Trump Family Wealth Gains in Second Term

Screengrab/CNN CNN’s MAGA panelist Scott Jennings was laughed at to his face when he tried to dismiss concerns about how much Donald Trump and his family have enriched themselves since his return to office.

During a typically argumentative roundtable debate on Sunday’s NewsNight with Abby Phillip , the panel discussed a September Gallup poll that found nearly 90 percent of Americans believe government corruption is “widespread”—a record-high figure that has risen sharply from 73 percent in 2024, before Trump’s second term.

Phillip suggested the dramatic rise could partly be attributed to the president’s personal net worth increasing by billions of dollars since he returned to office, which she said is “unheard” of and “has literally never happened before.” Trump’s estimated net worth is around $7 billion, according to Forbes.

That represents an increase of around $2.7 billion since he won the 2024 election, largely driven by his pivot to cryptocurrency, which has contributed a significant share of the president’s wealth.

Alyssa Farah Griffin, a former Trump White House communications director who is now a vocal critic of the 80-year-old president, added that the “level of personal enrichment of people around the president” is also unprecedented.

“I always called out the Bidens, Hunter Biden, but this is completely different and on a much grander scale,” Griffin said.

When Phillip asked Jennings whether that was a sentiment everyone could agree with, he replied: “I don’t disagree that people have had a higher net worth.” Jennings’ response drew immediate laughter from the rest of the panel, with Democratic strategist David Axelrod mockingly asking, “How’d that happen?” “But some of these people had existing businesses before Trump ever came to politics,” Jennings added.

Phillip fired back, arguing that this was largely not the case with the president’s eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric.

While the brothers have long been involved in the family real estate business, they have also made vast sums of money through cryptocurrency ventures and investments in several companies that have been awarded major federal and military contracts during their father’s second term.

“They didn’t have existing businesses in crypto.

They didn’t have existing businesses in drones .

They didn’t have existing businesses in defense tech,” Phillip said.

“These are not existing businesses.” In July, The Washington Post reported that defense technology companies in which Eric and Trump Jr. had invested since the start of their father’s second term went on to generate at least $3.2 billion in direct government business, as well as $3.1 billion in future contract options.