He can’t help it. Donald Trump once again transformed his civil trial for financial fraud in a political forum, denouncing “electoral interference” four days before the Republican vote in Iowa, the starting point of his camp’s primaries of which he is the big favorite despite numerous legal uncertainties.
The former tenant of the White House (2017-2021) who dreams of returning there is accused with his sons Eric and Donald Jr of having colossally inflated during the 2010s the value of skyscrapers, luxury hotels or golfs at the heart of their empire, the Trump Organization, to obtain more favorable loans from banks and better insurance conditions.
New York State Attorney General Letitia James, who filed a civil complaint in the fall of 2022 for financial fraud, is seeking $370 million in compensation, but the lawsuit also threatens to take control away from the Trump family. of its real estate assets.
“Control your customer”
Returning to court on Thursday for final arguments, Donald Trump, 77, once again thundered in front of the press against “political interference”, “electoral interference at the highest level” and a “very unfair trial”.
The favorite of the Republican Party primaries wanted to provide his own pleading, a request refused by Judge Arthur Engoron who feared “a campaign speech” in the courtroom. Finally, the magistrate on Thursday authorized Donald Trump to develop some arguments, and the former president immediately took the opportunity to attack Letitia James.
“They want to make sure I never win (the election) again. She (attorney general) hates Trump… and if I can’t talk about it, it hurts me,” he said. The judge tried to interrupt him, but the former president of the United States retorted: “you are pursuing your own objective, you cannot listen for more than a minute.” “Control your client,” the magistrate retorted to Donald Trump’s lawyers.
Errors or fraud
Since the trial began on October 2, the billionaire and tribune has raged against justice at each of his appearances in the courtroom or in the corridors of the Manhattan courthouse, denouncing a political “witch hunt” or a “trial worthy of a banana republic.
For three months, the Trump clan’s lawyers have deemed the case legally empty. One of them, Chris Kise, recognized on Thursday possible “unintentional” errors in Mr. Trump’s financial declarations but without it being necessary to “conclude fraud”. But for prosecutors, “the myriad of deceptive schemes they used to inflate asset values and conceal facts was so outrageous that it cannot be explained innocently,” they wrote in a memo before the audience.
Fake bomb threat
In a sign of the tense climate surrounding the trial, police in Nassau County, on the Long Island peninsula east of New York, confirmed that Judge Engoron’s home had been the subject of an unfounded threat of alert with the bomb. In front of the courthouse, under the surveillance of a helicopter, some demonstrators chanted “no dictator in the United States”.
During the trial, Donald Trump violently attacked the judge’s team, the attorney general, and the magistrate imposed two fines totaling $15,000.
Unlike the criminal trials awaiting him this year, including that for his alleged maneuvers aimed at reversing the result of the 2020 presidential election, Donald Trump does not risk prison in this civil case. But he plays big.
Even before the trial, Judge Engoron estimated at the end of September that the prosecution presented “conclusive evidence that between 2014 and 2021, the defendants overvalued the assets” of the group by “812 million (to) 2.2 billion dollars » depending on the year, in Donald Trump’s financial documents.
As a result of “repeated fraud”, he ordered the liquidation of the companies managing his assets, such as the Trump Tower on 5th Avenue or the 40 Wall Street skyscraper in Manhattan. Measures however suspended on appeal.
The trial concerns other crimes, such as insurance fraud, and financial penalties demanded by the New York State Attorney General’s Office, which is now seeking $370 million, far from the $250 million in the 2022 complaint. It remains for Judge Engoron to close the proceedings and determine the amount of damage and reparations, with a decision expected in the coming weeks.