Donald Trump announced that Massad Boulos will be his advisor for Arab and Middle Eastern affairs. The Lebanese-American businessman was involved in the Trump campaign and is credited with winning votes from the Muslim minority. Boulos is the father-in-law of Tiffany, the daughter of the US president-elect.
Massad Boulos is the second father-in-law the future president has chosen to join his administration. On Saturday, the president-elect announced that he had named Charles Kushner as ambassador USA in France. Kushner is the father of Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, the husband of Ivanka Trump.
Boulos has extensive relationships in the Arab world. Moreover, he is in close contact with the parties to the political dispute Lebanonwhich has been a source of conflict in this country for many decades.
According to Reuters sources, the businessman's connections in Lebanese Hezbollah are particularly important. This Shiite organization supported by Iran has a very strong position in Lebanon's political institutions.
Boulos is a friend of Sulayman Antoine Faranjiyya, a Christian ally of Hezbollah who is a candidate for the presidency of Lebanon. Moreover, it is in close contacts with the Christian party Lebanese Forces, which is in turn an opposition force to Hezbollah.
The businessman was also an important element of the Republican Party's success in the presidential elections. His involvement with the Muslim minority in key states, mainly Pennsylvania and Michigan, is believed to have helped Trump gain the support of the nearly 300,000 members of that minority. In the 2020 elections, Muslims voted for Joe Bidenwhich helped him defeat Trump.
Massad BoulosGettyImages
Boulos was born in Lebanon and moved to Texas as a teenager. There he obtained a law degree and then worked in the family company – the large company SCOA Motors, which deals with, among others, distribution of motor vehicles in West Africa. He has dual citizenship: Lebanese and American.
His son Michael is the husband of Tiffany Trump – the only child of the Republican and his second wife Marly Maples, with whom they were married from 1993 to 1999. Tiffany met her future husband on the Greek island of Mykonos and started dating him in 2018. They got married in November 2022 at Mar-a-Lago.
Donald Trump's familyAntonina Długosińska/tvn24.pl
Main photo source: GettyImages