Donald Trump’s hotel properties were getting plenty of attention on Twitter in the early hours of Thursday morning – but not exactly the kind that makes for good marketing.
Lev Parnas, an associate of Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani who is now under criminal investigation, said on MSNBC that many of his meetings took place at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, DC.
He said many lawmakers, insiders and others just hoping to get the attention of Trump’s inner circle hung around the hotel.
“It was like a breeding ground at the Trump hotel,” Parnas told Rachel Maddow. “Every event would be there, so everybody would hang out there afterwards.”
Indeed, Washington-based accountability watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics tweeted that at least 217 members of Congress have turned up at the hotel.
The interview and the implications of Republican lawmakers and Trump insiders mingling with shady figures at the hotel caused #TrumpHotel to trend on Twitter, especially after MSNBC analyst David Corn compared it to the cantina at Mos Eisley from the first Star Wars movie: