Post Reports

While billions of dollars in American aid poured into Jordan over the past decade, a secret stream of money was flowing in the opposite direction as the country’s ruler, King Abdullah II, spent millions on extravagant homes in the United States.

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In the past decade, King Abdullah II of Jordan used an extensive network of offshore accounts to disguise multimillion-dollar purchases of lavish homes in the United States and Britain. Reporter Greg Miller on how the lavish purchases sit in stark contrast to Jordan’s recent economic and political struggles. 

These findings are revealed in a new investigation, the Pandora Papers, that exposes a hidden world that has allowed government leaders, a monarch, billionaires and criminals to shield their assets.

The Washington Post and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists gained unprecedented insight into the money flowing into U.S. trusts through a trove of more than 11.9 million documents — among the largest of its kind — maintained by financial services providers around the world.  

The United States has long condemned secretive offshore tax havens where the rich and powerful hide their money. But a burgeoning American trust industry now shelters the assets of wealthy foreigners by promising even greater secrecy and protection. That same secrecy has insulated the industry from meaningful oversight and allowed it to gain new footholds in states like South Dakota and Alaska.

The Washington Post and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) gained unprecedented insight into the money flowing into U.S. trusts through a trove of more than 11.9 million documents, among the largest of its kind, maintained by financial services providers around the world. 

Their findings are revealed in a new investigation, the Pandora Papers, that exposes how foreign political and corporate leaders or their relatives moved money and other assets from long-established tax havens to obscure trust companies in the United States. In many cases, the assets were connected to individuals or companies accused of fraud, bribery and human rights abuses in some of the world’s most vulnerable communities.

In this audio report, Post reporter Debbie Cenziper, producer Ted Muldoon and ICIJ reporter Will Fitzgibbon travel from the sugar cane fields of the Dominican Republic to the beaches of California to back rooms of Sioux Falls to examine how this industry came to be, who profits from it and whom it harms.

This week in Congress, top military officials are testifying on what went wrong in the U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan. Will anyone in the government be held accountable? 

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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and U.S. Central Command chief Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie are on Capitol Hill testifying in front of the Senate and House Armed Services committees on the fall of Kabul and the disastrous U.S. exit from Afghanistan. 

As lawmakers press for answers, Alex Horton reports on whether this hearing will result in accountability for the years of government missteps in handling the end of America’s longest war.