A billionaire Trump ally paid $13 million to buy ex-commerce secretary’s luxury DC home: report

In MAGA World, Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in South Florida is not only where the former president now lives — it is also where he conducts his political operation. But many Trump allies still have a strong presence in Washington, D.C. According to reporting in Politico's Playbook column on November 15, the Trump ally who has purchased the home of former Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross is PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel.

Playbook reports, "In August, former Trump Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and his wife Hilary Geary Ross sold their 10,000-square-foot home in Woodland-Normanstone for $13 million, according to D.C. tax records. It is the most expensive D.C. home sale of the last 12 months."

That deal, according to Politico Playbook, has been "shrouded in mystery."

"The purchaser used an LLC called Salona Village Holdings that concealed their identity," Playbook explains. "The Rosses are barred by a confidentiality agreement from disclosing the real buyer's name, Geary Ross told Daniel Lippman. But the secret is out. According to multiple sources, the anonymous buyer behind the LLC is Peter Thiel, the German-born billionaire co-founder of PayPal and friend of Trump. It is 'common knowledge' among neighbors and real estate sources, one well-informed person told Playbook."

Thiel, Playbook notes, has been supporting two Republicans in U.S. Senate races: Blake Masters in Arizona and "Hillbilly Elegy" author J.D. Vance in Ohio. Some pundits described Thiel as "libertarian" in the past, but there is nothing libertarian about Vance's campaign — which has combined faux-populism with hyper-nationalist MAGA themes and the type of extreme social conservatism that libertarians usually reject.

According to Playbook, "Thiel's political views are murky. Once known as a libertarian, his biographer, Max Chafkin, recently told Katie Fossett, 'There are aspects of Thiel's politics that aren't libertarian at all; they're closer to authoritarianism. It's super-nationalistic, it's a longing for a sort of more powerful chief executive — or, you know, a dictator, in other words."

Playbook reports that "Thiel's new home has seven bedrooms, a 12-seat theater, a library, a caterer's kitchen and staff quarters, according to a listing for the property."