# Massad Boulos

Massad Fares Boulos (Arabic: مسعد بولس; born 1971) is a Lebanese-born American businessman and political associate of President Donald Trump. He is the father of Michael Boulos and the father-in-law of Trump's daughter Tiffany. He supported Trump's successful presidential campaign in the 2024 presidential election, and canvassed for the support of Arab Americans, particularly in Michigan.
Boulos worked at SCOA Nigeria PLC, a trucking and heavy machinery dealership company and subsidiary of the Fadoul Group in Nigeria. He rose to prominence in 2018 when his son began to date Tiffany Trump. In December 2024, Trump designated Boulos his Middle East advisor.

## Early life

Boulos was born to a Lebanese Greek Orthodox Christian family in Kfaraakka, Koura, Lebanon (his surname meaning the apostle "Paul" in Arabic). Both his father and grandfather were figures in Lebanese politics and his father-in-law was a key funder of the Free Patriotic Movement.
He moved to Texas as a teenager. He graduated in 1993 from University of Houston–Downtown with a bachelor of business administration degree. Boulos also holds a Juris Doctor degree from the Thurgood Marshall School of Law at Texas Southern University. He was described by President Donald Trump as "an accomplished lawyer", however, he applied to take the bar exam in Texas in 1996 but there is no evidence of his admission. No evidence has been found that Boulos is licensed as a lawyer in any of the following countries: United States, Nigeria, Lebanon, or France.

## Career
### In business

After completing his education, Boulos moved to Nigeria to work at SCOA Nigeria PLC. SCOA is a trucking and heavy machinery dealership. Its shares trade for about two Nigerian naira, roughly a tenth of a US cent, a penny stock with a market capitalization worth about $865,000 as of 2024. Boulos’s personal stake is worth just $1.53 according to the company's latest annual report. Following Trump's announcement that he would appoint Boulos as a presidential advisor (see § US politics), he was "reported to have significant discrepancies between his public profile and documented business background". When asked by the New York Times to confirm the multibillion-dollar valuation of Boulos Enterprises, he did so, but he later claimed he did not mean that he was actually associated with or owned Boulos Enterprises, and that he did not correct public reports because he "made a practice of not commenting on his businesses"; Boulos Enterprises is owned by another family of the same name.

### Lebanese politics

Boulos has links to Christian politicians and parties in Lebanon, including Suleiman Frangieh and the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) both of which are Christian allies of Hezbollah but maintained talks with opposition parties like the Lebanese Forces. According to Aron Lund, quoting a report in As-Safir, Boulos began his political career as an ally of Michel Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement, and represented it in Nigeria, where Boulos did business. Boulos remained allied to Aoun after he agreed an alliance with Hezbollah. Boulos initially stood for parliament in Koura, but withdrew for another list involving the FPM, Marada (Frangieh's party), and the communists. In 2009, the FPM shortlisted him, but Aoun eventually chose another candidate. By 2018, he was a supporter of Frangieh's Marada. Aron Lund, an analyst at the Century Foundation, writes that his career "does not exactly indicate a firm commitment to either side in Lebanese or regional politics", and that his appointment suggests that Trump's Middle East policy "will often be more readily understood in light of the personalities orbiting Mar-a-Lago [a Trump-owned resort] than through an ideological prism or in terms of U.S. national interest."

### US politics

During the 2024 US presidential elections, Boulos campaigned for Trump in Muslim and Arab communities with Bishara Bahbah, who founded Arabs for Trump, and Richard Grenell. He sought to portray Trump as supportive of "global peace", according to Bahbah.
Boulos has acted as an intermediary between the Palestinian Authority and its leader, Mahmoud Abbas and Trump.
In December 2024 Boulos told Le Point that the 2024 Israel–Lebanon ceasefire agreement, including the requirement that Hezbollah should disarm, applied to the whole of Lebanon, not just areas south of the Litani river.
In March 2025, Semafor reported that Massad Boulos was to be appointed as President's special envoy for the African Great Lakes region. He is to receive diplomatic and security accreditation for a trip to Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Kigali in Rwanda. Boulos is described as Trump's “eyes and ears” in the region as the DRC is in the midst of a war with a Rwandan-backed separatist movement and seeks to sign a minerals deal with the US.

## Personal life

Boulos holds Lebanese, French and American citizenship.
He married Sarah Fadoul Boulos, who was born in Burkina Faso. Circa 1986, she lived in Houston, Texas, and graduated in Biology at Houston Baptist University in 1994. In 1996, Sarah left her job at the Texas Public Health Department and moved to Lagos, Nigeria to work at SCOA Nigeria as the Director of Trading and Logistics.
She is a philanthropist, entrepreneur and dance coach who in 2005 founded the Society for the Performing Arts in Nigeria (SPAN) in a small studio in her garage, gradually increasing its profile in Nigerian society. Sarah mentions that SPAN has reached more than 10,000 youth since its inception. More recently, she has been a franchisee of Creative Education International (CrEd) Lagos Island. As of 2020 she worked overseeing the imports of her business, La Pointe Delicatessen in Victoria Island, Lagos.
Sarah and Massad are devout Christians. Together they have four children, Michael, Fares, Oriane and Sophie. In 2022, their son Michael married Tiffany Trump, daughter of Donald Trump. Another son, Fares, is an actor who played a brief non-speaking role in The Crown.