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Eric Trump has addressed accusations that his friend Boris Epshteyn, a longtime counselor to his father, President-elect Donald Trump, was “shaking down” people who wanted to work for him in the Trump administration.

The president-elect’s “legal team discovered evidence that a top adviser requested retainer fees from prospective appointees in order to promote them for jobs in the new administration,” according to The New York Times.

A probe by Trump’s attorneys allegedly found that Epshteyn requested that Scott Bessent, whom Trump has appointed as his nominee for Treasury Secretary, pay him between $30,000 and $40,000 per month to gain his support as an advocate.

“Mr. Bessent declined. He also did not partake in another effort by Mr. Epshteyn, described in the report, to get him to invest in a three-on-three basketball league, but played along with him to avoid offending such a seemingly powerful figure in Mr. Trump’s world,” the NYT reported.

The report added: “Mr. Bessent then called Mr. Epshteyn on Nov. 14 to see whether he was criticizing Mr. Bessent to people around Mr. Trump, the review said. Mr. Epshteyn told Mr. Bessent that it was ‘too late’ to hire him and that he was ‘Boris Epshteyn,’ with an expletive between the two names. He then suggested the hiring was for consulting. The second person cited in the review was a defense contractor from whom Mr. Epshteyn sought $100,000 a month during the transition period. The report said Mr. Epshteyn depicted his own hiring as “do or die” for the person’s prospects, according to the review. The contractor did not hire Mr. Epshteyn and is fearful of retaliation, the review found.”

During an interview on Fox News, host Laura Ingraham asked Eric Trump about the report.

“Listen, I’ve known Boris for years, and I’ve never known him to be anything but a good human being. So that said, I will tell you, my father has been incredibly clear: You do not, you do not do that under any circumstance. And believe me, there will be repercussions if somebody was,” Trump replied.

“So, I’ve never seen that side of him. You know, I’ve known him for a very long time. And, you know, I certainly hope the reporting’s false. And I can also tell you if it’s true, you know, the person will probably no longer be around,” he concluded.

The report comes after President-elect Donald Trump handily defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in November’s election.

Vice President Kamala Harris allegedly told associates she was “staying in the fight” and considering a 2028 presidential campaign or a California gubernatorial run in 2026, prompting Democratic strategist Theryn Bond to urge Harris not to run for president again.

During an interview on Newsmax’s National Report, Bond said “please don’t” when asked if Harris should run for president again in 2028.

Host Emma Rechenberg asked: “The Vice president has been instructing advisers and allies to keep her options open. That could be a possible 2028 presidential run or even a run for governor in her home state of California in two years. Harris has reportedly repeating in phone calls, quote, ‘I’m staying in the fight.’ Let’s talk about it now with our political panelists. Theryn Bond joins us now, a Democratic strategist and Luke Ball is a Republican strategist. So two different perspectives here. Is this a good idea for VP Harris to continue her political ambitions?”

“Not to run for president again in 2028, please don’t. I can’t really speak for governor of California. Californians seem to support her significantly. We haven’t yet been able to measure what that support looks like after this current run she just had. That may be the only thing that she — I guess, may make sense for her to consider. But another shot at the presidency, I hope she doesn’t. And if she is relying on those same advisers that advised her this cycle, that’s not who I would listen to,” Bond responded.

After Harris lost to President-elect Donald Trump, Republican strategist Luke Ball concurred that a California gubernatorial campaign might be her only chance, stating, “I think she might have a hand up in California because I think that’s one of the only states where she might actually have an edge.”

“Well, I think she might have a hand up in California because I think that’s one of the only states where she might actually have an edge. She’d have high name ID. But if she ran anywhere else in the country, I don’t think she’d be able to get elected to dog catcher, unfortunately,” Ball began.

“Because if I’m a donor, if I’m a Democrat, I’m looking at this race and I’m looking at the aftermath as we start to go through the autopsy of the campaign, and I’m seeing that we’re paying millions of dollars to celebrities to astroturf the campaign instead of spending that money on critical resources Even like the DNC, if I’m on that side of the political aisle, I’m wondering why can’t we give that to staff members as opposed to sending it to celebrities?” Ball added.

“Paying $5,000 for having their nails done. Like the RNC went through this just over a year ago and we cleaned house ahead of the election. And I think that if I’m a Democrat strategist and I’m operating within the DNC, I’m having the same thought process. We have to have a come to Jesus meeting and figure out number one, who the heck is the leader of our party? Number two, what sort of drastic changes are we going to make to position ourselves to come up in this next upcoming midterm election and start to change the direction of the country from our perspective? So I don’t think Kamala Harris is going to have a shot at a national campaign anymore,” Ball concluded.

WATCH:

Earlier this month, Trump trolled Harris’ campaign after reports said it was in debt for as much as $20 million, though she spent $1 billion in a losing effort.

“I am very surprised that the Democrats, who fought a hard and valiant fight in the 2020 Presidential Election, raising a record amount of money, didn’t have lots of $’s left over,” Trump posted on X.

“Now they are being squeezed by vendors and others. Whatever we can do to help them during this difficult period, I would strongly recommend we, as a Party and for the sake of desperately needed UNITY, do,” he continued, “We have a lot of money left over in that our biggest asset in the campaign was ‘Earned Media,’ and that doesn’t cost very much. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”

Harris far outraised Trump but in the end, a majority of voters sided with him, giving him a massive electoral college victory as well as the national vote.

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