President Donald Trump said Friday, September 18, 2026, in the Oval Office that his son Donald Trump Jr. has paid back — or is paying back — Russian businessman Umar Kremlev, who ProPublica reported earlier in the week spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on post-wedding celebrations in the Bahamas.

ABC News, AFP, CNN, and The Washington Post all covered the exchange. A person close to Donald Trump Jr. confirmed the repayment to The Washington Post; a source familiar with the matter likewise told the New York Post that Kremlev had been “made whole,” without specifying an amount. ABC News said it asked the White House and the Trump Organization for evidence of repayment and had not been shown any in its reporting.

What Trump said

Asked whether it was appropriate for his son to accept the gift, Trump told reporters the arrangement was allowed and common — then pivoted to repayment.

“Well, it’s totally, it’s totally allowed. And a lot of people have parties and all, but it’s totally allowed,” Trump said, according to ABC News. “But as I understand it, he paid them back. He didn’t want to have that, so I hear he paid them back.”

Pressed that the public had not previously heard about repayment, Trump said he had asked his son when the story broke. “He said, ‘No, I’m paying it back, Dad.’ So, and that was a while ago,” Trump added, per ABC. AFP’s account of the same exchange has Trump saying he had “heard he’s paid him.”

The gift — and who Kremlev is

ProPublica first reported that Kremlev footed bills for lavish post-wedding parties tied to Donald Trump Jr. and Bettina Anderson Trump’s May 2026 Bahamas nuptials — costs in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, including, per New York Post’s summary of that reporting, a private-island reception venue and fireworks.

Bettina Anderson Trump wrote on Instagram that Kremlev “very generously hosted two incredible nights of celebrations for us AFTER our wedding,” calling it “an extraordinary gift from a friend,” ABC News reported. AFP said the couple also described him as a “dear friend.”

Kremlev heads the International Boxing Association (IBA). The International Olympic Committee severed links with the IBA over governance and ethics concerns, AFP noted. Russian President Vladimir Putin presented Kremlev with Russia’s Order of Friendship in April 2026, according to an IBA press release and Reuters pool coverage of the Kremlin awards ceremony.

Kremlev’s press office told ProPublica the two men have a “friendly relationship” and first met “a couple of years ago,” ABC reported. Trump has said he did not know Kremlev and did not attend the wedding.

What is — and isn’t — proven

Trump’s Friday comments, plus WaPo’s and the New York Post’s sourcing that repayment occurred, are the administration-side answer to a story that started as an undeclared foreign gift. What remains unshown in public reporting is documentation of the amount repaid, when, and how. Critics framed the original gift as a potential conflict and leverage problem for the president’s family; Trump framed wedding parties as ordinary generosity and said his son chose to erase the debt. Without receipts, the country is left with dueling assertions — and a Kremlin-honored boxing executive still sitting in the middle of the photo.

Sources