"So you don't know if they're illegal or not, do you?"
yes we do.
They're illegal under the emoluments clause.
"Trump says" .....
trump is known to be a pathological liar.
80% of what he says is untrue.
You should also have a problem with trump taking money from any foreign 
national, especially russians since they hacked our election and installed him.
he's compromised to his reverse raccoon-look eyeballs.