Donald Trump accused of inflating property values: The former president has once again been accused of wrongdoing by the government- but this time, it has nothing to do with any of his four indictments
Donald Trump Has a New Problem
On top of the many kinds of legal jeopardy that former President Donald Trump faces, he’s also being sued in several different jurisdictions.
One of those is the New York Attorney General’s office, which sued Trump last September for $250 million, claiming that the ex-president and his family and company committed “numerous acts of fraud and misrepresentations” over many years. The suit names Trump, his three oldest children, and the Trump Organization.
“We found that Mr. Trump, his children, and the corporation used more than 200 false asset valuations over a ten-year period,” Attorney General Letitia James said when the suit was first announced.
That suit, unlike the four criminal indictments currently faced by the former president, is not a criminal case. But it is scheduled to go to trial in October, almost certainly prior to any of the criminal cases. Trump is not expected to be required to attend the trial, which was previously the case in the civil trial when he was sued by E. Jean Carroll, who accused him of rape as well as defamation. However, he was deposed in the case last spring.
And now, James has made a filing that is perhaps embarrassing to the ex-president.
According to CNN, Trump inflated his net worth by as much as $2.2 billion in one year. The AG’s office found that when it corrects financial statements to omit misevaluations, it “reduces Mr. Trump’s net worth by between 17-39% in each year, or between $812 million to $2.2 billion, depending on the year.”
The conclusion came as part of a partial summary judgment motion filed by James’ office.
“Based on the undisputed evidence, no trial is required for the court to determine that defendants presented grossly and materially inflated asset values in the (statements of financial condition) and then used those SFCs repeatedly in business transactions to defraud banks and insurers,” the motion said, per CNN.
“Notwithstanding defendants’ horde of 13 experts, at the end of the day, this is a documents case, and the documents leave no shred of doubt that Mr. Trump’s SFCs do not even remotely reflect the ‘estimated current value’ of his assets as they would trade between well-informed market participants.”
Trump’s attorneys, meanwhile, called for the case to be dismissed.
“The [statements of financial condition] at issue were simply not misleading. Therefore, the Defendants are entitled to summary judgment as a matter of law,” Trump’s attorneys said in response as reported by CNN. “The undisputed record further establishes his companies timely paid hundreds of millions of dollars in interest to their lenders and never defaulted on a loan or even been late on a loan payment during the entire 15+ year time period the NYAG has sought to scrutinize in this action.”
The state attorney general’s office also released a transcript of Trump’s deposition from April. The transcript of the seven-hour deposition runs for more than 400 pages.
“You don’t have a case and you should drop this case,” Trump said during the deposition, as reported by the Associated Press.
“I have a clause in there that says, ‘Don’t believe the statement. Go out and do your own work.’ This statement is ‘worthless.’ It means nothing,” Trump said of the notion that his financial statements to banks should be taken at face value.
“Do you know the banks were fully paid? Do you know the banks made a lot of money?” Trump testified in the deposition. “Do you know I don’t believe I ever got even a default notice, and even during COVID, the banks were all paid? And yet you’re suing on behalf of banks, I guess. It’s crazy. The whole case is crazy.”
Author Expertise and Experience
Stephen Silver is a Senior Editor for 19FortyFive. He is an award-winning journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Stephen has authored thousands of articles over the years that focus on politics, technology, and the economy for over a decade. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.
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