Thomas J. Barrack Jr. (b. 1947) is an American billionaire investor and founder of Colony Capital.

He served as chairman of Donald Trump’s 2017 Inaugural Committee and currently serves as U.S. Ambassador to Turkey and Special Envoy to Syria.

In July 2021, Barrack was arrested and charged with acting as an unregistered agent of the United Arab Emirates between April 2016 and April 2018. Prosecutors alleged he used his access to Trump and his campaign to advance UAE interests.

After a September 2022 trial, a federal jury acquitted him on all counts on November 4, 2022.

In November 2025, the U.S. House Oversight Committee released roughly 20,000 pages of emails from Jeffrey Epstein’s estate. Barrack appeared multiple times in the documents, including in a March 2016 message in which Epstein wrote to him: “Send photos of you and child. Make me smile.”

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https://manassa.news/en/stories/28554

Barrack surfaced in the leaked pages, in between soliciting images of “girls,” to “make him smile.” He lodged himself squarely in the networks etched by Epstein as a conduit to Trump’s ear. Even after the latter’s death, Barrack carries the mantle. In 2024, he was sworn in as the US ambassador to Turkey, and later appointed as Trump’s special envoy for Syria and Lebanon.

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Sources

Reuters, Nov. 2022; Time, Sept. 2022; The New Arab, Nov. 2025.