Struggles at Donald Trump’s Golf Courses: Tee Time Discounts Offered as Business Declines

Donald Trump’s Golf Courses Struggle to Attract Customers, Offering Online Discounts

Donald Trump’s golf courses are facing challenges in attracting customers, as discounts for tee times are being offered online. The Trump National Doral Golf Club in Miami, for instance, currently has close to full availability for tee times on Sunday, with 93 slots listed on its website. To entice customers, the club is offering discounts ranging from $11 to $45. These discounts come amidst reports of the Republican’s golf businesses experiencing difficulties.

Newsweek reached out to representatives for Trump and Trump National Doral Golf Club for comment, but no response has been received at the time of writing.

Financial filings from 2020 revealed that Doral made a profit of $4.3 million on $75 million of revenue in 2017. However, revenue dropped to less than $45 million in 2020, indicating a decline in business.

Trump’s Scottish resorts in Ayrshire and Aberdeenshire, which he purchased and developed with over $300 million in cash, also faced financial losses. Records show that these resorts lost more than $8 million in 2020 and $5.3 million in 2021.

According to a New York Times report from 2020, the 15 golf courses owned by the former president worldwide have collectively lost over $315 million in the past 20 years.

However, Trump’s financial disclosures to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) indicated that he earned as much as $555 million through his golf course assets between January 2022 and April 14, 2023. This amount accounts for roughly half of the $1.2 billion in income he reported during that period, as reported by Sportico earlier this year.

Some of Trump’s golf courses are currently involved in a lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James. The lawsuit alleges that Trump and top executives at The Trump Organization conspired to inflate his net worth by billions of dollars on financial statements provided to banks and insurers, aiming to secure loans and make lucrative deals.

In 2014, Trump valued his Aberdeenshire golf club at $327 million, based on the assumption that he had the right to build 2,500 luxury homes in the area. However, he only had approval to build fewer than 1,500 apartments and golf villas, casting doubt on the accuracy of the valuation.

Trump is also accused of using a fixed-assets scheme to value the Trump International Golf Links Scotland resort in Turnberry. This approach failed to consider any depreciation of the asset between 2017 and 2021.

New York prosecutors argue that Trump’s valuations were “false and misleading” since the Turnberry golf course has operated at a loss every year since its opening in 2017.

In September, Judge Arthur Engoron issued a partial summary of the civil fraud trial, ruling that Trump significantly inflated the value of his assets to obtain more favorable terms from lenders and insurers. As a result, any certificates filed under New York General Business Law Section 130 are now canceled. If Trump filed any golf clubs under Section 130, they are also affected by this ruling.

Among Trump’s two golf courses in New York, Trump National Golf Club Westchester is currently registered as a New York domestic LLC, while TNGC Hudson Valley, based in Hopewell Junction, is owned by a Delaware LLC.

Trump Endeavor 12 LLC, the holding company of the Doral golf club, is another defendant in the civil fraud case.