Albania protests are about more than Jared Kushner

There is an unfortunate tendency among American pundits and journalists to assume everything revolves around U.S. politics. Albania is only the latest case in point. In late May, protests erupted in Zvërnec, Albania, over plans by President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner to develop a sensitive environmental site into a multi-billion dollar accommodations.

Kushner, however, was only one of many sparks that ignited the protests. Alex Soros, who has cozied up to Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama to win approval for similar developments, was another. So too is Rama’s persecution of Albania’s Greek minority, who populate the Albanian Riviera. On May 12, 2023, for example, Rama’s police arrested Fredi Beleri, an ethnic Greek candidate for the mayoralty of Himara. The charge? He has misspent approximately $100 during his campaign. Albanians saw through the charade, Rama wanted his own henchmen to win to complete his own real estate deals. In that context, Kushner’s development was the symptom but not the cause.

Albania may have faded from the headlines in the West, but the protests have since been gaining momentum. Recent visitors to Albania say the mood is volatile as impatience with Rama’s self-dealing reaches a fever pitch. Today, Albanians speak not of Kushner or even the United States, but rather of the “Flamingo Revolution,” their corollary to the color revolutions that freed so many in Eastern Europe from dictatorship.

Albania, of course, is not communist, and, to ask the State Department, it is a thriving democracy. But that is not what Albanians say. As the Iron Curtain shattered, Albanians embraced democracy with enthusiasm. Albania became the most pro-American country in Europe, if not on Earth.

Then the State Department and USAID got involved. They helped stand up the Special Structure Against Corruption and Organized Crime (SPAK). To understand what happened next, imagine that Chicago Mafioso Al Capone took over the FBI before it ever had the opportunity to take him and the rest of the Chicago mafia down in the 1930s. Rama, the Socialist Party head, hijacked SPAK and used it to target anyone who threatened his power: former Prime Minister Sali Berisha, Defense Minister Fatmir Mediu, Deputy Prime Minister Arben Ahmetaj, and Tirana Mayor Erion Veliaj, among many others.

It was never about clean governance. As SPAK targeted anyone who asked Rama tough questions, Rama doubled down on both real estate schemes and apparent money laundering with drug cartels. Here, the mechanism was his decision to legalize marijuana cultivation. As soon as marijuana fields began to flourish, so did the cocaine trade from Latin America and West Africa, as well as the opium trade from Afghanistan and Turkey. The Italian coast guard regularly intercepts cocaine shipments into Albania; ironically, Rama’s coast guard does not.

Rama, meanwhile, openly followed the path of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It was not mere coincidence: A former Rama aide in the room when the two leaders met said Erdogan gave Rama a crash course on how to eviscerate a democratic system by targeting opponents and cultivating American diplomats. Erdogan consolidated power by hijacking the tax auditing authority that was Turkey’s equivalent of SPAK. He made retired American diplomats and attaches his business partners or at least gave them donations to support them in new think tank roles. Rama seems to do the same. Rama, like Erdogan, distributes patronage in the form of real estate concessions and development.

The State Department realizes its error; it has quietly removed Berisha from its visa blacklist, essentially recognizing that the charges against him were political rather than substantive.

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Trump critics describe him as the anti-King Midas, where everything he touches turns to lead.

In terms of foreign policy, however, their own Trump derangement syndrome can be as destructive. In Albania’s case, the desire to pile on Kushner blinds politicos to deeper issues that involve hijacking of American resources, growing organized crime and drug trafficking under the Rama regime, and questions over culpability of some previous American ambassadors who went all in on Rama.

Michael Rubin is director of policy analysis at the Middle East Forum, a distinguished fellow at India’s Usanas Foundation and a contributor to Beltway Confidential.