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Should this be normal? Donald Trump Jr’s May 24, 2026 3-day Bahamas wedding was heavily funded by Umar Kremlev, a Russian oligarch close to Vladimir Putin. According to reporting, Kremlev footed the bill for hundreds of thousands of dollars of wedding expenses. He paid to rent out one of the private islands. He also covered other big-ticket items, like a massive fireworks show. And his team helped plan the event. Kremlev is the head of the International Boxing Association, a scandal-plagued sports group that has been financed by the Russian state-owned energy giant Gazprom. The guest list numbered around 50. It included Trump Jr.’s brother-in-law Jared Kushner, Eric Trump — and Kremlev, an imposing man with a shaved head who speaks limited English. He was part of a large group whose presence puzzled other guests. They sometimes stood off by themselves, speaking Russian. “It was really small, like, just really close friends,” Trump Jr. later said on his podcast. National security experts expressed alarm. Their question?…What motivated Kremlev to spend a fortune cultivating this connection? “If I’m paying for your wedding, at some point, you’re going to owe me something,” said a retired career FBI counter-intelligence official. “Oligarchs like Kremlev often act in coordination with the Russian government. While it’s unclear if that happened here, Trump Jr. put himself in a precarious position, he said. “This should be unthinkable for the son of the president. End of story.” Another counter-intelligence official, who also worked for the FBI in Moscow, said Russian intelligence frequently seeks to build ties with US government officials and their family members. “Money is a tried-and-true method to gain access,” this official said. In the days leading up to Trump Jr.’s wedding, Kremlev was in China as part of the delegation accompanying Putin, according to Chinese state media. The month before, Putin had bestowed him with a state honor, the Order of Friendship. The Ukrainian government has imposed sanctions on Kremlev personally, citing his closeness to Putin and Russian security services. So why did Kremlev help pay for Trump Jr.’s wedding? The men appear to have met only recently. Trump Jr. could have afforded to pay for the entire wedding himself. President Trump himself skipped it. (“He’d like me to go, but it’s going to be just a small, little private affair,” the president told reporters beforehand. “I said, you know, this is not good timing for me.”) But many of the guests were immediate family of the bride and groom. And a group of Russians. “What are they doing here?” one person recalled thinking. At least one of the Russian guests had been with Kremlev on his China trip. And Kremlev’s right hand at the IBA attended the wedding too. Since the wedding, the Trumps have released scores of photos and videos of the shindig. While they show many of the guests, the Russians have been absent from all of them. (But the top of Kremlev’s head is visible in the back of one group photo posted on Instagram by a friend of the bride.) An IBA newsletter announced: “President Kremlev and Donald Trump Jr made it clear – this alliance will not remain symbolic. More joint initiatives will follow.” You shrug? Then replace ‘Donald Trump Jr.’ with ‘Hunter Biden’ and see if you can muster some slight concern. The entire Trump family seems embedded with Russia somehow. Do any of you know for certain the extent? Is it business? Business trading on presidential access? Business because of kompromat? Money laundering? Or just the logical outcome of a capitalist mentality bereft of ethics or scruples or even concern for the country that has allowed it to prosper from a place of freedom? A freedom that Russia would be very happy to destroy. Y’all might want to start asking some questions.