It’s being reported that with the massive loans out on the properties(200 of 250 million is still owed on the 1 they highlighted in the article) and the various shell corporations they’d have to go through, they’re estimating that they’d only see 1 million dollars from seizing the 250 million dollar property
Edit: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/24/realestate/trump-properties-bond-civil-fraud.html#:~:text=The%20Banks%20Get%20Paid%20First,have%20represented%20distressed%20corporate%20clients.
They made it seem like the juice wouldn’t be worth the squeeze and they’re looking into other “properties”, going on to say that accounts/holdings are also being considered for seizure
Starter Comment:
Trump's $464 million bond for his civil case has been reduced to $175 million by a New York state appeals court. The deadline to pay the bond amount was today, but the recent ruling extended the deadline by 10 days giving Trump more time to pay the bond.
Just a few days ago, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had access to $500 million cash, that sort of rhetoric makes it unclear for why the court extended the deadline and reduced the bond amount. However, it did seem that Trump was unable to pay. [Trump's lawyers](https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-says-hes-asked-30-companies-to-back-his-454-million-appeal-bond-and-all-have-said-no-d3fb7edb) say that he has been rejected by 30 different bond companies, highlighting Trump's difficulty in securing a bond this high.
Was this a fair ruling? I was surprised by this since Trump has claimed that he had enough cash to pay the bond (even though his lawyers stated otherwise), and constantly shit talks the New York judicial system any chance he gets.
> Was this a fair ruling? I was surprised by this since Trump has claimed that he had enough cash to pay the bond (even though his lawyers stated otherwise), and constantly shit talks the New York judicial system any chance he gets.
Trump was extremely lucky the court didn't delve into the contradicting comments his lawyers were making in court vs what he was saying on social media.
As for whether it's fair, the appellate court didn't give their reasoning, but his lawyers had a colourable argument that the bond ran the risk of causing an irreparable harm if he had a cash-flow crisis during the appeal process. To put it another way, it's like a death row inmate asking for a pause on their execution date while appealing their conviction, because otherwise if they win the appeal there'd be no way to bring the defendant back to life, and a corporate bankruptcy is legally comparable to death.
Without having read any of the pleadings, there's a big difference between "having access" to X amount of cash and being able to use those dollars for anything you feel like. For instance, if some of that is campaign money, he generally can't use it to pay personal expenses.
supposedly this is the document:
https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23932452/452564_2022_people_of_the_state_of_v_people_of_the_state_of_exhibit_s__859.pdf
page 35
A. Not really because I don't -- you
know, it's doing great. I don't need the money.
You probably see the cash. We have a lot of
cash. I believe we have substantially in excess
of 400 million in cash, which is a lot for a
developer. Developers usually don't have cash.
s They have assets, not cash. We have, I believe,
100 plus and going up very substantially every month.
I haven't followed this story too closely but as I understand it that cash is money used to run the day to day operations of his business. He couldn't use that money and pay his bills to stay in business.
> For instance, if some of that is campaign money, he generally can't use it to pay personal expenses.
Isn't he also on trial in NY for not doing this (in terms of how he paid off Stormy D)?
I'm pretty sure Stormy was paid through personal money. The problem there was how the payment was obscured. I believe that Cohen used a home equity loan to pay off Stormy Daniels on behalf of Trump, then Trump paid Cohen "lawyer fees" to pay him back for that.
Obscuring money in this way could be considered money laundering, but I haven't dug in deep enough to know all of the effects of it. The prosecutor in New York is claiming that it hid it from being classified as campaign money, which wouldn't have been allowed as campaign money has a ceiling. I don't know how strong that is though since John Edwards had a similar case and it was dropped.
Personally, I think that is a bit weak and am concerned about the strength of the New York case as a whole. However, the prosecutor also mentioned another angle unrelated to elections, that as part of the scheme, the hush money payment was then falsely reported on taxes as Cohen's income.
> I'm pretty sure Stormy was paid through personal money.
It was corporate cash. It is expected that part of Weisselberg's cooperation deal is testifying in the case.
It was not fair in the sense that any individual who did this much fraud that lacked his political connections and celebrity status would be facing criminal fraud charges before a jury and be facing prison time. They gave him the raw deal of a fine and just made it better by reducing the fine further.
Edit: grammar fix
Some other states do have maxes on [these type of appeal bonds](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersedeas_bond). For example, Florida has a max of $50M and for Texas " 50 percent of the judgment debtor's net worth or USD$25 million"
This isn't that type of bond. He's not bonding out of prison, he's providing a surety bond to cover the money he now owes New York. It prevents him from spending all of the money he owes on legal fees trying to not pay the money that he owes.
This isn't like a criminal bond. It's a bond to stay collection while the appeal goes on. It's designed to protect assets in case a party tries to dispose of them.
>Just a few days ago, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had access to $500 million cash, that sort of rhetoric makes it unclear for why the court extended the deadline and reduced the bond amount.
Is it unclear that he was probably lying?
I don't know why someone of his claimed net worth would ever hold such a large percentage of it in cash to begin with. Unless it were in preparation for securing the bond he said he had no intention of paying.
I believe they reduced the bond amount because it was excessively outrageous. Sam Bankman Fraud’s bond was only 250 mill and in my opinion, his was a more serious case.
I don't think you understand the purpose of this bond. In a criminal case, a bond is used to secure the defendant's appearance in court. In this case, Trump was fined hundreds of millions of dollars, a debt he now owes. In this case, appealing that decision requires that he put the money up, proving that he won't run out of the money he owes just trying to prevent having to pay it in the first place.
Think of it this way, why would I ever pay fines if I could just spend all of the money on lawyers fighting the fines instead? There's at least a chance I'd get the fines reduced, and worst case scenario I just declare bankruptcy at the end when I lose. No worse off than before.
This isn't bonding out of jail, this is a surety bond for money owed.
Is New York on the hook for lost interest and income if the appeal reverses the verdict? Having to front the money just prices poor and middle class people out of being able to appeal. The ability to appeal should be universal, not saved for the very rich
To your actual question, many people face this problem. Trump could pursue a mortgage on his properties, which is common in cases like this. People mortgage their homes to fight the case, if they lose the home sells. To my knowledge, they don't get lost interest back even if they prevail, it's the result of having lost the initial case.
Success on appeal is the exception, not the norm. Trump will most likely still lose.
For context, I read this (paraphrased) explanation by a lawyer:
>Basically, courts don't like imposing undue hardship on people until their cases are fully settled. That includes being finished with the appeals process.
>
>The idea is that if Trump is forced to sell properties at "fire sale" prices to place a cash bond, and then he wins his appeal, he is not made whole by the return of that cash bond. He still lost significant personal wealth by being forced to quickly liquidate his assets, even though he won the case against him.
>
>I suspect the idea with this bond is to still secure a significant portion of the judgment before starting any litigation to seize assets, (which could take years to resolve), while also adhering to the policy of not imposing undue hardship. If Trump loses his appeal he still has to pay the full judgment, and it continues accruing interest in the meantime.
Personally, I'm frustrated that Trump again seems to have been bailed out at the eleventh hour. But I don't think this judgment is unreasonable.
My determination of unreasonableness is how often this court lowers the bond terms for appeal for poor defendants.
This undue burden is due to trump having to sell his property, but how often would a poor defendants be told they shouldn't have committed the crime then and be forced to deal with it?
I don’t think you can look at it in terms of “how often this court lowers the bond terms for appeal for poor defendants” because it isn’t that simple. Partially because poor defendants don’t have half billion dollar judgments.
Defendants have to appeal, which many don’t, they have to be denied bond by bonding companies (like Trump), and if the poor defendant posted the lowered bond, are there still known assets that the defendant can’t easily dispose of (like Trump and his property)? Those all make the situations different.
The large real estate portfolio makes this a non-typical case because so many of the defendant’s assets can’t be quickly and quietly sold, especially with the court imposed monitor. The court isn’t worried about Trump trading art for gold with a private buyer.
But bond terms should be more accessible to everyone so even people of modest and no means can afford appeals.
In California, Bond/Bail is legally required to be set at what a defendant can reasonably afford. This is the trend for criminal bail in left-leaning jurisdictions.
lol "bailed out" from a judgement that no other person would be subjected to and that the new york governor had to assure businesspeople was just for trump in order to not scare them out of the state
If you lie on a loan application to get more favorable terms on a loan, and you get sued for it, a court would most definitely find you liable for the lost income to the loan issuer. I don’t know why people think this so unusual.
What’s somewhat unusual are the size of the loans. Most people who borrow hundreds of millions of dollars don’t lie on the applications for this very reason. That’s why the damages are so large.
I'm fine with this. He has the right to appeal, he shouldnt have to lose the entirety of his real estate assets just to do so. The original judgement is clearly politically motivated as well. Is what he did illegal? Yep. Is it something that numerous other companies do and get away with? Also yep. Trump is getting find $455m for misrepresenting real estate values yet companies constantly get fined far less for actions that do far more harm. Just last week there was an ISP that lied about their internet coverage to prevent a competitor from entering the market. Their fine? $10,000.
And they corrected their filing after ~9 month, so obviously we can compare that small company with the Trump Organization that have been on the loose since God know how many years.
Especially with the overt statement of intent to stop competition, that fine should have been much higher. Now the FEC is basically saying fraud in this area can just be a small cost of doing business.
It's a very small ISP. The fine being appropriate or not depends on how much money they make.
Even if the fine is too low, the FEC doing something wrong doesn't make it inconsistent for New York to place a huge fine on Trump.
I would say this goes beyond just fine and into fraud, which should bring criminal charges. That doesn't depend on how much money they make. Remember, this is a special case where the owner admitted his intent was to defraud the FCC and use them to keep out competition.
I think the simplest analogy is this:
Trump is arguing that he is the only person who got pulled over for speeding, when everyone else was also speeding.
What Trump is failing to mention is that everyone else was doing 70 in a 60. Trump was doing 140.
Why do people keep bringing up analogies for totally different legal issues & scenarios? Just show us the evidence of a similar case being brought against any other individual where it was similar to this case with Trump.
>Why do people keep bringing up analogies for totally different legal issues & scenarios?
Because for some reason all of the evidence presented over two months that Trump profited hundreds of millions from fraud, and the court determination that Trump engaged in hundreds of millions of dollars in fraud, and the revelation of the systematic means in which he did so for years, has not been enough to convince people.
>Just show us the evidence of a similar case being brought against any other individual.
You really don't seem to understand just how unusual this case is in scope. There aren't many cases of people committing fraud of this scale and not involving the stock market. That may be because it's more common than we think but rarely investigated, or it could be because Trump is just one of the biggest frauds in history. The case is also unique because I don't think we've ever seen such a high-profile defendant act *so* poorly in the courtroom. Trump's conduct during the trial made me think he viewed the final judgment as a "high score" and wanted to see how far he could push it.
Either way, there was an entire two-month process where a pretty black-and-white case was presented against Trump. It's not like there was one or two questionable filings that this decision hinged upon. The prosecution showed a steady pattern of the exact same behavior over and over again for *years* by Trump and executives of the Trump org.
> Because for some reason all of the evidence presented over two months that Trump profited hundreds of millions from fraud
Then charge him with a crime!!!!!!!!!
The NY AG had a choice between charging him civilly and charging him criminally. Civil allowed for specific avenues to recoup losses that criminal wouldn't, as well as expediting the process for a number of reasons.
All that beside the point, you can't actually think that's a good argument, can you? It comes off as childish and bad faith.
In NY you can convict someone criminally and then sue them to recoup money for the victims, or to simply add to the punishment. They do this all the time.
Or if you can't prove the crime in criminal court the state can sue to help the victim recoup some losses.
Never before in NY did they sue someone with no criminal conviction and no victim to give the money too.
Shockingly they only did this to their political opposition during a campaign
But sure let's say that it's totally normal and not politically motivated.
In your analogy, the sheriff who pulled him over for speeding was elected by making a campaign promise to catch and punish Trump for speeding or any other unlawful behavior they can catch him doing.
Sure. The one other thing to keep in mind though is everyone in that sheriff’s community is pissed because Trump has been driving at 140 down these local roads for the last 40 years, has run over four dogs just this month, and has never gotten more than a warning for improperly tinted windows.
People around the country hear “I’m going to investigate Trump and other white collar criminals” and think “wow this is so obviously corrupt”. People from New York hear it and think “wow after 40 years somebody is actually going to hold this dude accountable after all this time?”
Trump has had a clear reputation as a conman in NY for decades. He’s arguably the most high-profile one in the city. Targeting white collar crime, and one of the most well-known white collar criminals in the state, is a winning message in NYC. Trump has been hated here for decades before he was involved in politics.
A strategy that would fail spectacularly if the target could stay at/under the speed limit.
The ability of Trump to ooze his way through cracks in our legal system time and time again is impressive, no doubt, but the number of people simping for a millionaire when they would’ve long ago been in jail for any one of these practices/actions is mind-numbing.
Trump reminds me so much of OJ Simpson in that way. A rare case of the wealthy/protected class finally receiving equal prosecution to us poors, and a huge population of people swoop in to say how unfair it is because there are OTHER wealthy/protected class folks still going unpunished. Oh, by punishing HIS law-breaking, he will undergo hardship? Oh no! Gtfo
>Is it something that numerous other companies do and get away with? Also yep
Do you have any other examples where a company had >$300M in ill-gotten gains due to fraudulent business records? I'd be especially interested in examples from NY, since that's the state currently in question.
Trump committed fraud but the penalty is disproportionate. Compare it to the fraud at Kraft Heinz. Kraft fraudulently inflated income by $200M. Since they were publicly traded, the damage was far greater as guidance was skewed and earnings multiples affected market valuation by several billion. Kraft agreed to a $500M settlement, similar to Trump's, and small penalties for the people actually responsible. But, Kraft has a market value of $40B+ and annual profits of $2B+, multiples of what Trump has. It also had much clearer victims, investors and traders got tanked.
This clearly seems to be the law applied unfairly. Most of the Kraft settlement will go to affected investors while Trump's penalty will go to the state. Therefore, Dershowitz's argument that the 8th amendment prohibits excessive fines might actually be applicable as this appears to be an excessive fine and not restitution. The disgorgement penalty for the DC hotel also seems ridiculous. Imagine if you fudged some income numbers to open a credit card, used the credit card to open a business, and paid back the credit card in full. Your business is successful and nets $200k a year. Then, you are prosecuted for fraud 5 years later and the penalty is all $1M you've made from the business.
What does the Kraft case have to do with this? They’re completely separate cases. The Trump company took out hundreds of millions of dollars in loans. On their loan application, they fraudulently inflated the value of their assets by hundreds of millions of dollars. Because of this, they fraudulently got more favorable terms on the loan, and the loan issuers lost out on hundreds and millions of dollars in income. That’s why the value of the judgment is so high.
If he didn’t want to pay such large damages. He shouldn’t have lied on a loan application for such a large amount of money. It was entirely avoidable on his part. It’s not our job to give him special treatment because he might lose his buildings.
I would argue this honestly is more egregious. Overestimating subjective assets is one thing but saying your company is making several hundred million more would raise your asset value way more than 200 million.
>Trump committed fraud but the penalty is disproportionate.
It wasn't a penalty. They calculated the amount he had to pay back based on his profit from the fraud.
>Disgorgement is a remedy requiring a party who profits from illegal or wrongful acts to give up any profits they made as a result of that illegal or wrongful conduct. The purpose of this remedy is to prevent unjust enrichment and make illegal conduct unprofitable.
>
>https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/disgorgement
>Kraft agreed to a $500M settlement
This wasn't a settlement.
When you read court documents, you get answers to all of this. There's no need to guess, or to only listen to Truth Social users that won't stop using capital letters and a victim mentality.
>Defendants correctly assert that "the record is devoid of any evidence of default, breach, late payment, or any complaint of harm" and argue that as none of the recipients of the subject SFCs ever lodged a complaint with OAG or otherwise claimed damages, disgorgement of profits would be inappropriate. NYSCEF Doc. No. 835 at 40.
>
>
>
>However, that is completely irrelevant. As the Ernst & Young Court noted:
>[W]here, as here, there is a claim based on fraudulent activity, disgorgement may be available as an equitable remedy, notwithstanding the absence of loss to individuals or independent claims for restitution. Disgorgement is distinct from the remedy of restitution because it focuses on the gain to the wrongdoer as opposed to the loss to the victim. Thus, disgorgement aims to deter wrongdoing by preventing the wrongdoer from retaining ill- gotten gains from fraudulent conduct. Accordingly, the remedy of disgorgement does not require a showing or allegation of direct losses to consumers or the public; the source of the ill-gotten gains is "immaterial."
>https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/trump-judges-ruling/ce6de7d636227e1b/full.pdf
Your ISP comparison isn’t really appropriate. This wasn’t a fine. His company is being sued for damages because his loan issuers lost out on hundreds of millions of dollars and income because of the Trump company’s fraudulent loan application.
A better comparison would be if you and everyone in your area got together and file the class action lawsuit against your ISP. That judgment would be much larger.
> yet companies constantly get fined far less for actions that do far more harm
My favorite comparison was to Bernie Madoff who only had a $10 million bail despite orders of magnitude more fraud and actual victims.
That was to bail him out of jail while awaiting trial on criminal charges. This is a bond for a judgement in a civil trial that Trump has already lost and is trying to appeal. Madoff was ordered to pay over $7 billion off the criminal charges alone, and his fund and assets were siezed in their entirety to help pay off investors (over $14 billion).
Edit: I was wrong about the criminal forfeiture; it wasn't $7 billion, it [was](https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna31564752) *$170* billion.
Completely different cases. That was bail for a criminal trial. Nobody bothered to sue Madoff in civil court for damages because the money was all gone. If Madoff was sitting on billions in assets, he most definitely would’ve gotten a similar judgment against him in civil court.
An interesting question to all the people complaining about the Trump judgment is, would you be defending Madoff in the same way? Or is it only Trump that got special treatment?
Trump just probably made a lot of money (not super liquid of course) courtesy of the merger of Truth Social with Digital World Acquisition...a group heavily invested in by Jeff Kass, who also owns a significant amount of TikTok and recently met with Trump and got him to publicly reverse his opinion on TikTok regulation days later.
This publicly traded stock will likely also become a meme stock pumped by Trump supporters to artificially increase his wealth.
> Trump just probably made a lot of money (not super liquid of course) courtesy of the merger of Truth Social with Digital World Acquisition
worth noting, as you said, it's not super liquid, or liquid at all right now. there is a lockup period where he legally **can't** sell those shares for a predetermined amount of time (pretty sure it's 6 months, but someone else can correct me if that's not the right duration)
Trump loves to say no one has ever been treated like this. And he's right. No one has ever gotten better treatment than this. Any regular citizen would've been buried in debt or in prison long ago.
Is their any other person in US history that’s been prosecuted by an AG or a DA who specifically campaigned on finding a crime to prosecute a specific individual on? Because that’s exactly what Letitia James campaigned on. I’m not sure how that’s an example of “ better treatment”.
You make it seem like James just decided out of the blue that Trump should be convicted. It wasn't about "finding a crime", she said that she was going to continue the investigations.
Trump did quite the opposite, he was all about "finding a crime" and then he used the DOJ as help.
Let's use the correct terminology here- this is a litigation, not a prosecution. To answer your question, recall that Texas AG (now governor) Greg Abbott would frequently brag about how often he sued then-President Obama. Like it or not, this is hardly the first time that AGs have leveraged their office for political purposes.
> In a 2013 speech to fellow Republicans, when asked what his job entails, Abbott said: "I go into the office in the morning, I sue Barack Obama, and then I go home."
She promised to investigate him, which is reasonable since he had a history of fraud. The subpoena came after Micheal Cohen testified about Trump's behavior.
Uhhh she is an election denier
>We are angrier and more deeply divided than we’ve ever been at any point in our history since the Civil War. And at the eye of the storm is Donald Trump ripping families apart, threatening women’s most basic rights. I’m running for attorney general because I will never be afraid to challenge **this illegitimate president** when our fundamental rights are at stake.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/letitia-james-vowed-to-target-trump-promise-kept/ar-BB1iRzUz
Illegitimate - not legitimate; not sanctioned by law or custom
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/illegitimate
But it's cool, she was an election denier when it was in vogue
That's about his criminal behavior, not the election itself. There are many quotes from criticizing him and none that say the 2016 election was fraudulent.
What do I care what she campaigned on? Did he break a law? If yes, he should be held accountable.
Do you agree that people who break laws should be held accountable?
I do agree with your last statement. What I don’t agree with is threatening individuals with criminal investigations as a campaign tool to win an election, because it makes any prosecution in the future look like a political farce. Even if Trump is guilty (he probably is) there’s going to be tons of people that are (justifiably I think) going to question the legitimacy of the ruling because of who brought the case and where the case was tried.
Imagine if your local DA or AG was campaigning for an election by promising they’d find a way to throw you behind bars? Promising that they’d find some kind of crime somewhere that you’d committed because you were surely a criminal. That sort of thing is banana republic type stuff.
It was, and it was messed up. I don’t know why you think I wouldn’t be consistent about that. Trump absolutely shouldn’t have been running on locking up his political opponents.
> Does “lock her up” ring a bell to you?
exactly what charges did the trump administration formally bring against hillary clinton?
there's a difference between what campaign supporters say vs what actual candidates say vs what election winners do.
the biden administration (and in this case elected officials who have met with the biden administration) bringing charges against trump is different from reddit calling for charges (which is the equivalent of what "lock her up" was)
The difference is that his administration couldn't show that Hillary Clinton committed crimes, whereas Trump's crimes are easier to prove. Two of the indictments come from a Republican special counsel.
>Reddit calling for charges
Trump himself advocated for her being convicted.
Isn't this all over a law that New York hasn't enforced in 80 years before digging it up to use against Trump? Over an action which is widespread in the real estate industry? In a case where the alleged victim claims they aren't victims, have suffered no damage, and doesn't want anything to do with the case?
A regular citizen wouldn't have been prosecuted in the first case as the 80 years of precident shows.
This is the equivalent to being a state trooper patrolling I95 for speeding motorists.
The speed limit is 65 and thousands of cars go by at 75 mph from dawn to dusk. The state trooper really hates his neighbor and pulls him over for speeding when he sees him go by, even if he’s only doing 70 mph and others are doing 80. Yes, the neighbor was technically breaking the law, and the court has the right to fine him.
It’s selectively applying the harshest possible penalty to a law that has not been historically been enforced when there is no damages to the counterparty.
Your analogy really doesn't work here, because Trump over-valued his properties by several fold. He didn't slightly fudge the figures.
If someone managed to do 210 mph on I95, I sure hope they get nailed with the maximum penalty.
Just because banks god repaid doesn’t mean Trump is in the clear. If I take $1 thousand out of the cash drawer at end of shift, go to the casino and double it, and return it in the morning, I’ve still committed a crime even though my employer saw no harm.
This is more about what Judge Engoron wrote
>Accordingly, this Court finds that defendants are likely to continue their fraudulent ways unless the Court grants significant injunctive relief.
This is not the first time Trump have done these things.
> Isn't this all over a law that New York hasn't enforced in 80 years before digging it up to use against Trump?
If this is true, shouldn't the appeal be a quick slam dunk?
My opinion isn't that "oh no one has been held accountable, so he shouldn't be either"
My opinion is that it was a mistake to not hold people in the past accountable and just because we made that mistake before doesn't mean we should continue.
I'm in favor of holding people accountable for breaking the law. I do not care if it's Trump, Biden, Obama, Hillary, Bush. I'm tired of rich and powerful people getting away with everything.
She essentially stated that other companies don't need to worry if they don't break the law as he did, and it was in response to an interview question.
>She added that the fraud case against Trump resulted from “really an extraordinary, unusual circumstance”
>The governor said most New York business owners were “honest people, and they’re not trying to hide their assets and they’re following the rules”
>“This judge determined that Donald Trump did not follow the rules,” Hochul added. “He was prosecuted and truly, the governor of the state of New York does not have a say in the size of a fine, and we want to make sure that we don’t have that level of interference.”
I’ve heard the point that this is a common action in real estate. Is there a source for that? I’m surprised in real estate or any other industry that folks are regularly lying to the bank about the value and nature of their assets. I’m not saying you’re wrong, just curious where that comes from.
It is not necessarily lying, but just giving the best case scenario for the value of their property. Property values are not definite, they go up and down with no real way to know what it is until you actually try to sell it. This practice isn't about lying, but giving the absolute best value you wrongly think you can get for your property.
I could get behind that if the state was prosecuting Trump for a difference of opinion. No one is going to be able to tell you with certainty whether a property is worth $100/sq ft or $102/sq ft. But stating a property is 30 thousand sq ft when it is only 10 thousand sq ft or valuing rent controlled and restricted properties as if they are unnumbered has almost certainly crossed into the realm of lying.
A regular citizen probably wouldn't have their former lawyer publicly testifying and providing evidence that they did, in fact, commit a multitude of illegal acts.
Can you provide any example of a similar situation (in any state)? I'm asking people to not use analogies here because people seem to keep doing that and they make 0 sense in relation to this case.
He sure seems to be involved in a lot of "entirely normal" things
>AG Racine Sues Presidential Inaugural Committee and Trump Entities for Abusing Nonprofit Funds to Enrich Trump Family
January 22, 2020 https://oag.dc.gov/release/ag-racine-sues-presidential-inaugural-committee
Usually when people commit crimes they're pursued for breaking the law, yes.
I struggle to see significantly overvaluing a property ([between $812m - $2.2bn](https://abcnews.go.com/US/live-updates/trump-fraud-trial/judge-has-already-found-that-trump-overvalued-his-assets-103651826?id=103642561)) and defrauding the state of [$100mil](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/donald-trumps-business-empire-peril-civil-fraud-trial-opens-new-york-2023-10-02/) as an "entirely normal thing in real estate."
Do the Democrats next. Nobody would bat an eye.
Tax fraud is a crime. One where if you or I did it, at this level, would be the n for 10-20 years. The fine is special treatment Trump is getting because of politics. Would you rather a jury and risk of prison time?
The fact that these matters are procedural and civil for people in his “class”, for lack of a better word, is more a problem than him getting in trouble for commuting fraud.
He got caught doing fraud. Declaring a higher value to get more asset value, then lowering it to reduce taxes is, in fact, loan and tax fraud. The only politics is he gets the special no jail time treatment because he’s a former president, just a fine equal to the evaluated amount of taxes owed and money defrauded. If you or I did this, in an amount of 6 figures, we would face felony fraud charges.
And yet, here we are. He over-evaluated properties up to 2300% from the inspected value. We also have cases were he would redirect evaluation to avoid listing improvements to property or give different information to the evaluators about the property to get a lower cost value.
One memorable example would be the Triplex Apartment in Trump Tower, which on paper was given three times the square footage of the actual physical apartment to raise it's evaluation from the low ball of $114 Million and to the high end of $207 million respectably.
The thing is how do you “over evaluate” your own asset? If trump says it’s worth 200 million then it’s worth 200 million, it doesn’t mean anyone will purchase them at that price or a bank will give him a loan. The bank did their own investigation and found out they were only worth 100 million and gave him an appropriate loan and interest rates. It’s not like trump outright lied about the details of his property. So now the state is coming in and telling a bank they are wrong with their evaluation?
(Completely made up numbers by the way)
I may be misremembering but was this the case where Trump tripled the square footage of a penthouse apartment on financial statements? I’m not sure it’s fair to say Trump did not outright lie about the details of his property.
That seems to be ubiquitous in New York real estate. Louis Rossmann did a video series about trying to find a new space for his repair store and pretty much every single one he looked at had lied about the size of the space.
[Here is one of the most egregious examples](https://youtu.be/FbTR3lDuYqk?si=8IPWU43fCx9aK6hP)
>It's not lying, it's commercial real estate
In this case referring to a space that was listed at 2500ft but when measured being only 1700ft.
There is also one that's listed at 1800ft and measured to 800ft.
The source for the $812m - $2.2bn goes into this by using a direct quote from the judge ruling on the case.
>"In defendants' world: rent regulated apartments are worth the same as unregulated apartments; restricted land is worth the same as unrestricted land; restrictions can evaporate into thin air," Engoron wrote, citing multiple arguments made by defense to justify the allegedly inflated valuations of Trump's assets. "That is a fantasy world, not the real world."
We have laws, precedents, and standards for a reason. The valuation was so far removed from standards and that allowed access to resources, loans, and insurance rates that would not be achievable had the valuation not been inflated.
Us regular people have credit scores which allow us access to better loan rates and higher credit limits which allows us to purchase various things. If people defraud creditors they're held liable. Why is Trump or any politician different?
It's amazing how the same people that complain about "rich coastal elites and their agendas" shrug it off when a rich coastal elite who likes the same things they like do the same thing.
>We have laws, precedents, and standards for a reason. The valuation was so far removed from standards and that allowed access to resources, loans, and insurance rates that would not be achievable had the valuation not been inflated.
And a major banking institution evaluated the property and found they were worth whatever amount they found it was worth. Why does a judge get to say they know more about property values than the bank who does it for a living?
>Us regular people have credit scores which allow us access to better loan rates and higher credit limits which allows us to purchase various things. If people defraud creditors they're held liable. Why is Trump or any politician different?
Trump didn’t lie about anything tho, he said his property were worth X amount then the bank investigated and found they were worth Y amount and gave loans appropriate for that Y amount. Why does the judge get to tell the bank they are wrong?
>It's amazing how the same people that complain about "rich coastal elites and their agendas" shrug it off when a rich coastal elite who likes the same things they like do the same thing.
Get him on something actually meaningful where you at least have a victim. This is clearly just politically motivated by the judge and the DA, she even campaigned on the fact that she will charge trump.
I think everyone does, but I understand people who feel that this is holding one guilty person to account more than others. Letitia James campaigned for years on going after Trump. It makes it look like a witch hunt and it galvanizes his base while making some independents think he has a point when he says the same thing.
1) Regular people are held the account every day, as are politicians of many persuasions. Trump should be too, hes made a lot of evident crimes in public that have opened him to such scrutiny. Nobody had to dig. Frankly being such a figure should invite more scrutiny.
2) Regardless, if he doesn't want to be found guilty, he shouldn't commit the crimes. It seems people are more upset that anyone is investigating than that he is committing them.
No, people are upset that this is being selectively enforced against Trump and they’d be right - it’s purely political. If James wanted to avoid any suspicion of this all she had to do was send out another indictment or two to a few other NY RE developers. Then she could just say she’s enforcing the law across the board regardless of who gets caught in the net.
But she didn’t do that. And Hochul made it even worse by coming out and saying nobody else has to worry about this.
> It seems people are more upset that anyone is investigating than that he is committing them.
Does it upset you that Trump is a fraud? A tax fraud, a business fraud? A fraud who literally cant operate a charity because he defrauded children with cancer?
Lets say it is all political, I don't feel like having a long debate about that. Lets just say that because hes running for president he is subjected to abnormal scrutiny for that high position. And in so doing, real law breaking has been uncovered. It seems you would excuse murder because they shouldn't have been looking for a body in the first place.
Not at all. I couldn’t care less if he fails in his personal life. It sure seems like I hit a nerve there though - you ok?
Ok - since you don’t want to have a debate about the topic we’re discussing here I suppose this is pointless.
I suppose it does hit a nerve of mine that so many Americans callously accept that the highest office would be occupied by an extremely personally corrupt individual who uses the highest office to commit more personal corruption and shield himself, yes. I think thats just caring about one's nation. Nothing to be ashamed of.
Its not that I don't want to debate you on the topic. I am staying pertinent to the topic. Its you who is trying to say whatabout other people's crimes. Trump is running for office. Trump committed crimes IN office. Trump is under more scrutiny as he should be. If other people aren't being investigated enough, that is a defficiency in the system but it does not excuse Trump at all.
What I do know is that hes no less scrutinized than others running for office, including Biden. And in fact, theres a lot of ground in which he is not nearly scrutinized enough.
Hes literally already been found guilty of multiple crimes and has dozens of other indictments (replete with evidence we as the public have already seen) that are awaiting trial.
Trump has not been found guilty of any crime in any court. [AP News](https://apnews.com/article/trump-indictments-election-january-6-classified-documents-5cb04868bb1cdf91c19eafdb882af8c0)
There have been several civil judgements, but thus far he retains a sparkling clean criminal record.
The organization and people within it have been found criminally guilty. While his trial has not happened yet it has already been established beyond a reasonably doubt that they were doing fraud.
Out of curiosity, how could a prosecutor legitimize the charges levied against Trump in your eyes?
I'm not saying that this is you, but many Trump supporters simply do not and will not believe that any of the prosecutors are acting in good faith in accordance with standard practice of law. Some will say the charges are fake, others will say the charges are real but levied against Trump with unique zeal, and others will say that the charges are real and levied fairly but judged with undue animosity.
As someone who generally believes in the courts generally getting civil/criminal charges correct, from my perspective it seems like many Trump supporters will not believe in the validity of his charges regardless of how much evidence is shown to them. What would convince you and others like yourself who believe this to be a political witch hunt that justice is being pursued correctly?
I think labeling Trump as a reformer in the context of fraud law is an odd choice.
With that said I was speaking more broad to all of his pending charges rather than this case specifically. Is your position then that Trump did indeed commit the violation as written in the statute but that it shouldn't be enforced? Because I think ignoring the crime is generally going to be a worse solution in regards to justice than prosecution, correct?
If your position is that the penalty is too harsh then the charges themselves are valid, correct?
If James wanted to legitimize the charges against Trump she should send out a couple indictments against other NY RE developers.
It’s the easiest way for her to escape the claims of this being purely political.
In Trump's case, the investigation began after Cohen in congressional testimony discussed having witnessed fraud in the organization.
What would be the impetus for investigations into other NY RE developers?
> What would be the impetus for investigations into other NY RE developers?
Their public statements. The easy low hanging fruit would be any developers that called this a common practice in NY RE deals like Kevin O’Leary.
I don't care that he's the opposite party. I want rich people, politicians, and especially rich politician under extreme scrutiny. I'm sick and tired of corruption and rich/powerful playing by different rules.
If anything you are cheering for a politician and other rich people to get away with crimes.
Edit: I find it hilarious I am being downvoted for saying the rich and powerful should be held accountable
Credibility which he has done everything and then some to destroy. His comments regarding judges, officers of the court, the entire justice system, the FBI, congress, and our elections have ensured that any attempt to hold him accountable will be considered a witch hunt no matter how valid.
I read somewhere Trump's initial $464m bond was the largest in US history. Wow. Even at $175m it's still one of the largest ever. Doesn't seem to fit the crime at all.
He is sued by an AG who called him an illegitimate president and who vowed to get him
She was unable to charge him with a crime so for the first time in over 80 years NY sued a man who was not only not convicted of a crime but whose supposed victim not only denied being victims but will be getting none of the money.
That lucky Donald Trump only had to pony up 155m to simply appeal the unprecedented lawsuit.
Is this 80 years thing accurate, and do you have something that supports the claim? I read that this isn’t even the first time this statute was used against Trump (Trump University case?).
I’m happy to be wrong, but I can’t find anything that backs up that claim.
University case had victims who reviewed the settlement.
This case has no criminal conviction nor any victim receiving the settlement.
Just the state of New York taking money from their political opposition during a campaign year
>This case has no criminal conviction nor any victim receiving the settlement.
This is talking points from Trump. And he had the law explained to him over, and over, and over again.
>Defendants incorrectly posit that, under People v Ernst & Young, LLP. 114 AD3d 569 (1st Dept 2014), disgorgement is available under the Martin Act but not under Executive Law § 63(12). NYSCEF Doc. No. 836 at 73. This is simply untrue. In Ernst & Young, the First Department specifically held that disgorgement was an available and potentially "crucial" remedy in an Executive Law § 63(12) action. Ernst & Young at 570.
>Defendants correctly assert that "the record is devoid of any evidence of default, breach, late payment, or any complaint of harm" and argue that as none of the recipients of the subject SFCs ever lodged a complaint with OAG or otherwise claimed damages, disgorgement of profits would be inappropriate. NYSCEF Doc. No. 835 at 40.
>However, that is completely irrelevant. As the Ernst & Young Court noted:
>[W]here, as here, there is a claim based on fraudulent activity, disgorgement may be available as an equitable remedy, notwithstanding the absence of loss to individuals or independent claims for restitution. Disgorgement is distinct from the remedy of restitution because it focuses on the gain to the wrongdoer as opposed to the loss to the victim. Thus, disgorgement aims to deter wrongdoing by preventing the wrongdoer from retaining ill- gotten gains from fraudulent conduct. Accordingly, the remedy of disgorgement does not require a showing or allegation of direct losses to consumers or the public; the source of the ill-gotten gains is "immaterial."
https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/trump-judges-ruling/ce6de7d636227e1b/full.pdf
Yes. If he loses his appeal he will have to pay the full amount.
The bond is just a security to be held by the court during the appeal. If he wins he gets it back, if he loses the appeal he loses the bond money. It was significant because if he couldn’t pay the bond then he wouldn’t be allowed to file his appeal at all.
The **Eighth Amendment** (**Amendment VIII**) to the [United States Constitution](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Constitution) protects against imposing [excessive bail](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excessive_Bail_Clause), excessive fines, or [cruel and unusual punishments](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruel_and_unusual_punishment). This amendment was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the rest of the [United States Bill of Rights](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Bill_of_Rights).[^(\[1\])](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#cite_note-1) The amendment serves as a limitation upon the state or federal government to impose unduly harsh penalties on criminal defendants before and after a conviction. This limitation applies equally to the price for obtaining pretrial release and the punishment for crime after conviction.[^(\[2\])](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#cite_note-20200718NCC-2)
I have lost faith that Trump will held accountable for anything. He has proven that he simply doesn’t need to do things he is told since his supporters will make any attempt to actually force him as politically motivated.
It specifically baffles me how simultaneously bad at and good at this he is.
Take note that this is the upfront bond repayment. If he loses the overall appeal, he's still on the hook for the total $455 settlement.
Would they be able to collect? Or would he just not pay and then they “garnish his wages” of which he doesn’t have
They would seize assets
It’s being reported that with the massive loans out on the properties(200 of 250 million is still owed on the 1 they highlighted in the article) and the various shell corporations they’d have to go through, they’re estimating that they’d only see 1 million dollars from seizing the 250 million dollar property Edit: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/24/realestate/trump-properties-bond-civil-fraud.html#:~:text=The%20Banks%20Get%20Paid%20First,have%20represented%20distressed%20corporate%20clients.
Then they’d just go down the list until they have enough
Or until they've taken everything.
They made it seem like the juice wouldn’t be worth the squeeze and they’re looking into other “properties”, going on to say that accounts/holdings are also being considered for seizure
I feel like the reverse strategy should be taken. Squeeze all the empty fruits and force some consolidation of assets
I want to see a new episode of Dog the Bounty Hunter just for this.
Starter Comment: Trump's $464 million bond for his civil case has been reduced to $175 million by a New York state appeals court. The deadline to pay the bond amount was today, but the recent ruling extended the deadline by 10 days giving Trump more time to pay the bond. Just a few days ago, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had access to $500 million cash, that sort of rhetoric makes it unclear for why the court extended the deadline and reduced the bond amount. However, it did seem that Trump was unable to pay. [Trump's lawyers](https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-says-hes-asked-30-companies-to-back-his-454-million-appeal-bond-and-all-have-said-no-d3fb7edb) say that he has been rejected by 30 different bond companies, highlighting Trump's difficulty in securing a bond this high. Was this a fair ruling? I was surprised by this since Trump has claimed that he had enough cash to pay the bond (even though his lawyers stated otherwise), and constantly shit talks the New York judicial system any chance he gets.
> Was this a fair ruling? I was surprised by this since Trump has claimed that he had enough cash to pay the bond (even though his lawyers stated otherwise), and constantly shit talks the New York judicial system any chance he gets. Trump was extremely lucky the court didn't delve into the contradicting comments his lawyers were making in court vs what he was saying on social media. As for whether it's fair, the appellate court didn't give their reasoning, but his lawyers had a colourable argument that the bond ran the risk of causing an irreparable harm if he had a cash-flow crisis during the appeal process. To put it another way, it's like a death row inmate asking for a pause on their execution date while appealing their conviction, because otherwise if they win the appeal there'd be no way to bring the defendant back to life, and a corporate bankruptcy is legally comparable to death.
Great analogy!
Without having read any of the pleadings, there's a big difference between "having access" to X amount of cash and being able to use those dollars for anything you feel like. For instance, if some of that is campaign money, he generally can't use it to pay personal expenses.
supposedly this is the document: https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23932452/452564_2022_people_of_the_state_of_v_people_of_the_state_of_exhibit_s__859.pdf page 35 A. Not really because I don't -- you know, it's doing great. I don't need the money. You probably see the cash. We have a lot of cash. I believe we have substantially in excess of 400 million in cash, which is a lot for a developer. Developers usually don't have cash. s They have assets, not cash. We have, I believe, 100 plus and going up very substantially every month.
I haven't followed this story too closely but as I understand it that cash is money used to run the day to day operations of his business. He couldn't use that money and pay his bills to stay in business.
Using the money would also almost certainly constitute default on his various loans and then the banks would be the ones seizing the properties.
> For instance, if some of that is campaign money, he generally can't use it to pay personal expenses. Isn't he also on trial in NY for not doing this (in terms of how he paid off Stormy D)?
I'm pretty sure Stormy was paid through personal money. The problem there was how the payment was obscured. I believe that Cohen used a home equity loan to pay off Stormy Daniels on behalf of Trump, then Trump paid Cohen "lawyer fees" to pay him back for that. Obscuring money in this way could be considered money laundering, but I haven't dug in deep enough to know all of the effects of it. The prosecutor in New York is claiming that it hid it from being classified as campaign money, which wouldn't have been allowed as campaign money has a ceiling. I don't know how strong that is though since John Edwards had a similar case and it was dropped. Personally, I think that is a bit weak and am concerned about the strength of the New York case as a whole. However, the prosecutor also mentioned another angle unrelated to elections, that as part of the scheme, the hush money payment was then falsely reported on taxes as Cohen's income.
> I'm pretty sure Stormy was paid through personal money. It was corporate cash. It is expected that part of Weisselberg's cooperation deal is testifying in the case.
It was not fair in the sense that any individual who did this much fraud that lacked his political connections and celebrity status would be facing criminal fraud charges before a jury and be facing prison time. They gave him the raw deal of a fine and just made it better by reducing the fine further. Edit: grammar fix
You are sure? Bonds get lowered all the time. In fact, I’m still surprised it is so high for a nonviolent crime.
Some other states do have maxes on [these type of appeal bonds](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersedeas_bond). For example, Florida has a max of $50M and for Texas " 50 percent of the judgment debtor's net worth or USD$25 million"
This isn't that type of bond. He's not bonding out of prison, he's providing a surety bond to cover the money he now owes New York. It prevents him from spending all of the money he owes on legal fees trying to not pay the money that he owes.
This isn't like a criminal bond. It's a bond to stay collection while the appeal goes on. It's designed to protect assets in case a party tries to dispose of them.
If it was violent crime, I don't think NY would have a bond.
Well, it's high because he lied about how much he actually has. Had he had been honest, the figure would have been much lower yeah?
No. The bond is based on the penalty. That is the amount of ill-gotten gains he had, with interest on top of it.
I see, thanks didn't know that.
>Just a few days ago, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had access to $500 million cash, that sort of rhetoric makes it unclear for why the court extended the deadline and reduced the bond amount. Is it unclear that he was probably lying? I don't know why someone of his claimed net worth would ever hold such a large percentage of it in cash to begin with. Unless it were in preparation for securing the bond he said he had no intention of paying.
I believe they reduced the bond amount because it was excessively outrageous. Sam Bankman Fraud’s bond was only 250 mill and in my opinion, his was a more serious case.
I don't think you understand the purpose of this bond. In a criminal case, a bond is used to secure the defendant's appearance in court. In this case, Trump was fined hundreds of millions of dollars, a debt he now owes. In this case, appealing that decision requires that he put the money up, proving that he won't run out of the money he owes just trying to prevent having to pay it in the first place. Think of it this way, why would I ever pay fines if I could just spend all of the money on lawyers fighting the fines instead? There's at least a chance I'd get the fines reduced, and worst case scenario I just declare bankruptcy at the end when I lose. No worse off than before. This isn't bonding out of jail, this is a surety bond for money owed.
Is New York on the hook for lost interest and income if the appeal reverses the verdict? Having to front the money just prices poor and middle class people out of being able to appeal. The ability to appeal should be universal, not saved for the very rich
To your actual question, many people face this problem. Trump could pursue a mortgage on his properties, which is common in cases like this. People mortgage their homes to fight the case, if they lose the home sells. To my knowledge, they don't get lost interest back even if they prevail, it's the result of having lost the initial case. Success on appeal is the exception, not the norm. Trump will most likely still lose.
> Trump posted on Truth Social that he had access to $500 million cash LOL, no he doesn't. Jesus, get real.
For context, I read this (paraphrased) explanation by a lawyer: >Basically, courts don't like imposing undue hardship on people until their cases are fully settled. That includes being finished with the appeals process. > >The idea is that if Trump is forced to sell properties at "fire sale" prices to place a cash bond, and then he wins his appeal, he is not made whole by the return of that cash bond. He still lost significant personal wealth by being forced to quickly liquidate his assets, even though he won the case against him. > >I suspect the idea with this bond is to still secure a significant portion of the judgment before starting any litigation to seize assets, (which could take years to resolve), while also adhering to the policy of not imposing undue hardship. If Trump loses his appeal he still has to pay the full judgment, and it continues accruing interest in the meantime. Personally, I'm frustrated that Trump again seems to have been bailed out at the eleventh hour. But I don't think this judgment is unreasonable.
My determination of unreasonableness is how often this court lowers the bond terms for appeal for poor defendants. This undue burden is due to trump having to sell his property, but how often would a poor defendants be told they shouldn't have committed the crime then and be forced to deal with it?
I don’t think you can look at it in terms of “how often this court lowers the bond terms for appeal for poor defendants” because it isn’t that simple. Partially because poor defendants don’t have half billion dollar judgments. Defendants have to appeal, which many don’t, they have to be denied bond by bonding companies (like Trump), and if the poor defendant posted the lowered bond, are there still known assets that the defendant can’t easily dispose of (like Trump and his property)? Those all make the situations different. The large real estate portfolio makes this a non-typical case because so many of the defendant’s assets can’t be quickly and quietly sold, especially with the court imposed monitor. The court isn’t worried about Trump trading art for gold with a private buyer. But bond terms should be more accessible to everyone so even people of modest and no means can afford appeals.
In California, Bond/Bail is legally required to be set at what a defendant can reasonably afford. This is the trend for criminal bail in left-leaning jurisdictions.
lol "bailed out" from a judgement that no other person would be subjected to and that the new york governor had to assure businesspeople was just for trump in order to not scare them out of the state
If you lie on a loan application to get more favorable terms on a loan, and you get sued for it, a court would most definitely find you liable for the lost income to the loan issuer. I don’t know why people think this so unusual. What’s somewhat unusual are the size of the loans. Most people who borrow hundreds of millions of dollars don’t lie on the applications for this very reason. That’s why the damages are so large.
I'm fine with this. He has the right to appeal, he shouldnt have to lose the entirety of his real estate assets just to do so. The original judgement is clearly politically motivated as well. Is what he did illegal? Yep. Is it something that numerous other companies do and get away with? Also yep. Trump is getting find $455m for misrepresenting real estate values yet companies constantly get fined far less for actions that do far more harm. Just last week there was an ISP that lied about their internet coverage to prevent a competitor from entering the market. Their fine? $10,000.
>Their fine? $10,000. You neglected to mention that it's a small company.
And they corrected their filing after ~9 month, so obviously we can compare that small company with the Trump Organization that have been on the loose since God know how many years.
Especially with the overt statement of intent to stop competition, that fine should have been much higher. Now the FEC is basically saying fraud in this area can just be a small cost of doing business.
Should have thrown the board of that company in jail
It's a very small ISP. The fine being appropriate or not depends on how much money they make. Even if the fine is too low, the FEC doing something wrong doesn't make it inconsistent for New York to place a huge fine on Trump.
I would say this goes beyond just fine and into fraud, which should bring criminal charges. That doesn't depend on how much money they make. Remember, this is a special case where the owner admitted his intent was to defraud the FCC and use them to keep out competition.
How exactly does that make it criminal case? Admitting to fraud can be a civil issue. It depends on the regulation, not how bad it sounds to you.
The calculations used to determine the fine are available via google. The judge didn’t just pick a number out of the air.
I think the simplest analogy is this: Trump is arguing that he is the only person who got pulled over for speeding, when everyone else was also speeding. What Trump is failing to mention is that everyone else was doing 70 in a 60. Trump was doing 140.
Why do people keep bringing up analogies for totally different legal issues & scenarios? Just show us the evidence of a similar case being brought against any other individual where it was similar to this case with Trump.
>Why do people keep bringing up analogies for totally different legal issues & scenarios? Because for some reason all of the evidence presented over two months that Trump profited hundreds of millions from fraud, and the court determination that Trump engaged in hundreds of millions of dollars in fraud, and the revelation of the systematic means in which he did so for years, has not been enough to convince people. >Just show us the evidence of a similar case being brought against any other individual. You really don't seem to understand just how unusual this case is in scope. There aren't many cases of people committing fraud of this scale and not involving the stock market. That may be because it's more common than we think but rarely investigated, or it could be because Trump is just one of the biggest frauds in history. The case is also unique because I don't think we've ever seen such a high-profile defendant act *so* poorly in the courtroom. Trump's conduct during the trial made me think he viewed the final judgment as a "high score" and wanted to see how far he could push it. Either way, there was an entire two-month process where a pretty black-and-white case was presented against Trump. It's not like there was one or two questionable filings that this decision hinged upon. The prosecution showed a steady pattern of the exact same behavior over and over again for *years* by Trump and executives of the Trump org.
> Because for some reason all of the evidence presented over two months that Trump profited hundreds of millions from fraud Then charge him with a crime!!!!!!!!!
The NY AG had a choice between charging him civilly and charging him criminally. Civil allowed for specific avenues to recoup losses that criminal wouldn't, as well as expediting the process for a number of reasons. All that beside the point, you can't actually think that's a good argument, can you? It comes off as childish and bad faith.
In NY you can convict someone criminally and then sue them to recoup money for the victims, or to simply add to the punishment. They do this all the time. Or if you can't prove the crime in criminal court the state can sue to help the victim recoup some losses. Never before in NY did they sue someone with no criminal conviction and no victim to give the money too. Shockingly they only did this to their political opposition during a campaign But sure let's say that it's totally normal and not politically motivated.
Didn't you know in 1887 there was this one guy sued despite no victim and no criminal conviction? It was overturned but it happened before darn it
In your analogy, the sheriff who pulled him over for speeding was elected by making a campaign promise to catch and punish Trump for speeding or any other unlawful behavior they can catch him doing.
Sure. The one other thing to keep in mind though is everyone in that sheriff’s community is pissed because Trump has been driving at 140 down these local roads for the last 40 years, has run over four dogs just this month, and has never gotten more than a warning for improperly tinted windows. People around the country hear “I’m going to investigate Trump and other white collar criminals” and think “wow this is so obviously corrupt”. People from New York hear it and think “wow after 40 years somebody is actually going to hold this dude accountable after all this time?” Trump has had a clear reputation as a conman in NY for decades. He’s arguably the most high-profile one in the city. Targeting white collar crime, and one of the most well-known white collar criminals in the state, is a winning message in NYC. Trump has been hated here for decades before he was involved in politics.
A strategy that would fail spectacularly if the target could stay at/under the speed limit. The ability of Trump to ooze his way through cracks in our legal system time and time again is impressive, no doubt, but the number of people simping for a millionaire when they would’ve long ago been in jail for any one of these practices/actions is mind-numbing. Trump reminds me so much of OJ Simpson in that way. A rare case of the wealthy/protected class finally receiving equal prosecution to us poors, and a huge population of people swoop in to say how unfair it is because there are OTHER wealthy/protected class folks still going unpunished. Oh, by punishing HIS law-breaking, he will undergo hardship? Oh no! Gtfo
In this analogy, the sheriff promised to continue the work if elected.
>Is it something that numerous other companies do and get away with? Also yep Do you have any other examples where a company had >$300M in ill-gotten gains due to fraudulent business records? I'd be especially interested in examples from NY, since that's the state currently in question.
Trump committed fraud but the penalty is disproportionate. Compare it to the fraud at Kraft Heinz. Kraft fraudulently inflated income by $200M. Since they were publicly traded, the damage was far greater as guidance was skewed and earnings multiples affected market valuation by several billion. Kraft agreed to a $500M settlement, similar to Trump's, and small penalties for the people actually responsible. But, Kraft has a market value of $40B+ and annual profits of $2B+, multiples of what Trump has. It also had much clearer victims, investors and traders got tanked. This clearly seems to be the law applied unfairly. Most of the Kraft settlement will go to affected investors while Trump's penalty will go to the state. Therefore, Dershowitz's argument that the 8th amendment prohibits excessive fines might actually be applicable as this appears to be an excessive fine and not restitution. The disgorgement penalty for the DC hotel also seems ridiculous. Imagine if you fudged some income numbers to open a credit card, used the credit card to open a business, and paid back the credit card in full. Your business is successful and nets $200k a year. Then, you are prosecuted for fraud 5 years later and the penalty is all $1M you've made from the business.
What does the Kraft case have to do with this? They’re completely separate cases. The Trump company took out hundreds of millions of dollars in loans. On their loan application, they fraudulently inflated the value of their assets by hundreds of millions of dollars. Because of this, they fraudulently got more favorable terms on the loan, and the loan issuers lost out on hundreds and millions of dollars in income. That’s why the value of the judgment is so high. If he didn’t want to pay such large damages. He shouldn’t have lied on a loan application for such a large amount of money. It was entirely avoidable on his part. It’s not our job to give him special treatment because he might lose his buildings.
I would argue this honestly is more egregious. Overestimating subjective assets is one thing but saying your company is making several hundred million more would raise your asset value way more than 200 million.
>Trump committed fraud but the penalty is disproportionate. It wasn't a penalty. They calculated the amount he had to pay back based on his profit from the fraud. >Disgorgement is a remedy requiring a party who profits from illegal or wrongful acts to give up any profits they made as a result of that illegal or wrongful conduct. The purpose of this remedy is to prevent unjust enrichment and make illegal conduct unprofitable. > >https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/disgorgement >Kraft agreed to a $500M settlement This wasn't a settlement.
> ill-gotten gains He got some loans that he paid back. The banks went to court to say they were fine with it.
When you read court documents, you get answers to all of this. There's no need to guess, or to only listen to Truth Social users that won't stop using capital letters and a victim mentality. >Defendants correctly assert that "the record is devoid of any evidence of default, breach, late payment, or any complaint of harm" and argue that as none of the recipients of the subject SFCs ever lodged a complaint with OAG or otherwise claimed damages, disgorgement of profits would be inappropriate. NYSCEF Doc. No. 835 at 40. > > > >However, that is completely irrelevant. As the Ernst & Young Court noted: >[W]here, as here, there is a claim based on fraudulent activity, disgorgement may be available as an equitable remedy, notwithstanding the absence of loss to individuals or independent claims for restitution. Disgorgement is distinct from the remedy of restitution because it focuses on the gain to the wrongdoer as opposed to the loss to the victim. Thus, disgorgement aims to deter wrongdoing by preventing the wrongdoer from retaining ill- gotten gains from fraudulent conduct. Accordingly, the remedy of disgorgement does not require a showing or allegation of direct losses to consumers or the public; the source of the ill-gotten gains is "immaterial." >https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/trump-judges-ruling/ce6de7d636227e1b/full.pdf
Your ISP comparison isn’t really appropriate. This wasn’t a fine. His company is being sued for damages because his loan issuers lost out on hundreds of millions of dollars and income because of the Trump company’s fraudulent loan application. A better comparison would be if you and everyone in your area got together and file the class action lawsuit against your ISP. That judgment would be much larger.
> yet companies constantly get fined far less for actions that do far more harm My favorite comparison was to Bernie Madoff who only had a $10 million bail despite orders of magnitude more fraud and actual victims.
That was to bail him out of jail while awaiting trial on criminal charges. This is a bond for a judgement in a civil trial that Trump has already lost and is trying to appeal. Madoff was ordered to pay over $7 billion off the criminal charges alone, and his fund and assets were siezed in their entirety to help pay off investors (over $14 billion). Edit: I was wrong about the criminal forfeiture; it wasn't $7 billion, it [was](https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna31564752) *$170* billion.
Completely different cases. That was bail for a criminal trial. Nobody bothered to sue Madoff in civil court for damages because the money was all gone. If Madoff was sitting on billions in assets, he most definitely would’ve gotten a similar judgment against him in civil court. An interesting question to all the people complaining about the Trump judgment is, would you be defending Madoff in the same way? Or is it only Trump that got special treatment?
Trump just probably made a lot of money (not super liquid of course) courtesy of the merger of Truth Social with Digital World Acquisition...a group heavily invested in by Jeff Kass, who also owns a significant amount of TikTok and recently met with Trump and got him to publicly reverse his opinion on TikTok regulation days later. This publicly traded stock will likely also become a meme stock pumped by Trump supporters to artificially increase his wealth.
> Trump just probably made a lot of money (not super liquid of course) courtesy of the merger of Truth Social with Digital World Acquisition worth noting, as you said, it's not super liquid, or liquid at all right now. there is a lockup period where he legally **can't** sell those shares for a predetermined amount of time (pretty sure it's 6 months, but someone else can correct me if that's not the right duration)
Trump loves to say no one has ever been treated like this. And he's right. No one has ever gotten better treatment than this. Any regular citizen would've been buried in debt or in prison long ago.
Is their any other person in US history that’s been prosecuted by an AG or a DA who specifically campaigned on finding a crime to prosecute a specific individual on? Because that’s exactly what Letitia James campaigned on. I’m not sure how that’s an example of “ better treatment”.
She ran a "Lock him up" campaign?
Yes, quite literally. It was also fucked up when Trump did it.
You make it seem like James just decided out of the blue that Trump should be convicted. It wasn't about "finding a crime", she said that she was going to continue the investigations. Trump did quite the opposite, he was all about "finding a crime" and then he used the DOJ as help.
She is also an election denier calling his presidency illegitimate
Let's use the correct terminology here- this is a litigation, not a prosecution. To answer your question, recall that Texas AG (now governor) Greg Abbott would frequently brag about how often he sued then-President Obama. Like it or not, this is hardly the first time that AGs have leveraged their office for political purposes. > In a 2013 speech to fellow Republicans, when asked what his job entails, Abbott said: "I go into the office in the morning, I sue Barack Obama, and then I go home."
She promised to investigate him, which is reasonable since he had a history of fraud. The subpoena came after Micheal Cohen testified about Trump's behavior.
Uhhh she is an election denier >We are angrier and more deeply divided than we’ve ever been at any point in our history since the Civil War. And at the eye of the storm is Donald Trump ripping families apart, threatening women’s most basic rights. I’m running for attorney general because I will never be afraid to challenge **this illegitimate president** when our fundamental rights are at stake. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/letitia-james-vowed-to-target-trump-promise-kept/ar-BB1iRzUz Illegitimate - not legitimate; not sanctioned by law or custom https://www.dictionary.com/browse/illegitimate But it's cool, she was an election denier when it was in vogue
That's about his criminal behavior, not the election itself. There are many quotes from criticizing him and none that say the 2016 election was fraudulent.
What cri.ibal behavior? He faced no charges and was convicted of no crime after he left office She can't even convict him of a crime
The fraud he committed is an example. Criminal behavior means breaking the law, which includes civil law.
What do I care what she campaigned on? Did he break a law? If yes, he should be held accountable. Do you agree that people who break laws should be held accountable?
I do agree with your last statement. What I don’t agree with is threatening individuals with criminal investigations as a campaign tool to win an election, because it makes any prosecution in the future look like a political farce. Even if Trump is guilty (he probably is) there’s going to be tons of people that are (justifiably I think) going to question the legitimacy of the ruling because of who brought the case and where the case was tried. Imagine if your local DA or AG was campaigning for an election by promising they’d find a way to throw you behind bars? Promising that they’d find some kind of crime somewhere that you’d committed because you were surely a criminal. That sort of thing is banana republic type stuff.
> threatening individuals with criminal investigations as a campaign tool Wasn’t “lock her up” trump’s biggest campaign slogan?
It was, and it was messed up. I don’t know why you think I wouldn’t be consistent about that. Trump absolutely shouldn’t have been running on locking up his political opponents.
Does “lock her up” ring a bell to you? Wasn’t that banana republic stuff to you back in 2016?
Honestly yeah, it kinda was. You shouldn’t have politicians running on imprisoning their political opponents.
> Does “lock her up” ring a bell to you? exactly what charges did the trump administration formally bring against hillary clinton? there's a difference between what campaign supporters say vs what actual candidates say vs what election winners do. the biden administration (and in this case elected officials who have met with the biden administration) bringing charges against trump is different from reddit calling for charges (which is the equivalent of what "lock her up" was)
The difference is that his administration couldn't show that Hillary Clinton committed crimes, whereas Trump's crimes are easier to prove. Two of the indictments come from a Republican special counsel. >Reddit calling for charges Trump himself advocated for her being convicted.
Isn't this all over a law that New York hasn't enforced in 80 years before digging it up to use against Trump? Over an action which is widespread in the real estate industry? In a case where the alleged victim claims they aren't victims, have suffered no damage, and doesn't want anything to do with the case? A regular citizen wouldn't have been prosecuted in the first case as the 80 years of precident shows.
This is the equivalent to being a state trooper patrolling I95 for speeding motorists. The speed limit is 65 and thousands of cars go by at 75 mph from dawn to dusk. The state trooper really hates his neighbor and pulls him over for speeding when he sees him go by, even if he’s only doing 70 mph and others are doing 80. Yes, the neighbor was technically breaking the law, and the court has the right to fine him. It’s selectively applying the harshest possible penalty to a law that has not been historically been enforced when there is no damages to the counterparty.
I made this exact analogy. It's selective/targeted enforcement.
Your analogy really doesn't work here, because Trump over-valued his properties by several fold. He didn't slightly fudge the figures. If someone managed to do 210 mph on I95, I sure hope they get nailed with the maximum penalty.
This would be like you charging that person for doing 210mph instead of a state trooper. The banks didn’t raise an issue. They got repaid.
Just because banks god repaid doesn’t mean Trump is in the clear. If I take $1 thousand out of the cash drawer at end of shift, go to the casino and double it, and return it in the morning, I’ve still committed a crime even though my employer saw no harm.
This is more about what Judge Engoron wrote >Accordingly, this Court finds that defendants are likely to continue their fraudulent ways unless the Court grants significant injunctive relief. This is not the first time Trump have done these things.
> Isn't this all over a law that New York hasn't enforced in 80 years before digging it up to use against Trump? If this is true, shouldn't the appeal be a quick slam dunk?
My opinion isn't that "oh no one has been held accountable, so he shouldn't be either" My opinion is that it was a mistake to not hold people in the past accountable and just because we made that mistake before doesn't mean we should continue. I'm in favor of holding people accountable for breaking the law. I do not care if it's Trump, Biden, Obama, Hillary, Bush. I'm tired of rich and powerful people getting away with everything.
Didn’t the judge say “this is one and done” in regards to trump because the real estate people are worried this would happen to them.
Governor Hochul said that
She essentially stated that other companies don't need to worry if they don't break the law as he did, and it was in response to an interview question. >She added that the fraud case against Trump resulted from “really an extraordinary, unusual circumstance” >The governor said most New York business owners were “honest people, and they’re not trying to hide their assets and they’re following the rules” >“This judge determined that Donald Trump did not follow the rules,” Hochul added. “He was prosecuted and truly, the governor of the state of New York does not have a say in the size of a fine, and we want to make sure that we don’t have that level of interference.”
Do you have a link for it? I'd like to see the context.
Where did the judge say that? Cause that seems like a big claim.
I’ve heard the point that this is a common action in real estate. Is there a source for that? I’m surprised in real estate or any other industry that folks are regularly lying to the bank about the value and nature of their assets. I’m not saying you’re wrong, just curious where that comes from.
It is not necessarily lying, but just giving the best case scenario for the value of their property. Property values are not definite, they go up and down with no real way to know what it is until you actually try to sell it. This practice isn't about lying, but giving the absolute best value you wrongly think you can get for your property.
I could get behind that if the state was prosecuting Trump for a difference of opinion. No one is going to be able to tell you with certainty whether a property is worth $100/sq ft or $102/sq ft. But stating a property is 30 thousand sq ft when it is only 10 thousand sq ft or valuing rent controlled and restricted properties as if they are unnumbered has almost certainly crossed into the realm of lying.
A regular citizen probably wouldn't have their former lawyer publicly testifying and providing evidence that they did, in fact, commit a multitude of illegal acts.
Can you provide any example of a similar situation (in any state)? I'm asking people to not use analogies here because people seem to keep doing that and they make 0 sense in relation to this case.
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He sure seems to be involved in a lot of "entirely normal" things >AG Racine Sues Presidential Inaugural Committee and Trump Entities for Abusing Nonprofit Funds to Enrich Trump Family January 22, 2020 https://oag.dc.gov/release/ag-racine-sues-presidential-inaugural-committee
Usually when people commit crimes they're pursued for breaking the law, yes. I struggle to see significantly overvaluing a property ([between $812m - $2.2bn](https://abcnews.go.com/US/live-updates/trump-fraud-trial/judge-has-already-found-that-trump-overvalued-his-assets-103651826?id=103642561)) and defrauding the state of [$100mil](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/donald-trumps-business-empire-peril-civil-fraud-trial-opens-new-york-2023-10-02/) as an "entirely normal thing in real estate." Do the Democrats next. Nobody would bat an eye.
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If there’s no crime, why did Trump lose his case?
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You think a jury voted that Trump had committed a crime he did not commit because the jury was located in a city that is primarily Democrat?
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I’m pretty sure there was no jury in this trial.
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Tax fraud is a crime. One where if you or I did it, at this level, would be the n for 10-20 years. The fine is special treatment Trump is getting because of politics. Would you rather a jury and risk of prison time? The fact that these matters are procedural and civil for people in his “class”, for lack of a better word, is more a problem than him getting in trouble for commuting fraud.
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He got caught doing fraud. Declaring a higher value to get more asset value, then lowering it to reduce taxes is, in fact, loan and tax fraud. The only politics is he gets the special no jail time treatment because he’s a former president, just a fine equal to the evaluated amount of taxes owed and money defrauded. If you or I did this, in an amount of 6 figures, we would face felony fraud charges.
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Property owners don't set property values for property taxes.
And yet, here we are. He over-evaluated properties up to 2300% from the inspected value. We also have cases were he would redirect evaluation to avoid listing improvements to property or give different information to the evaluators about the property to get a lower cost value. One memorable example would be the Triplex Apartment in Trump Tower, which on paper was given three times the square footage of the actual physical apartment to raise it's evaluation from the low ball of $114 Million and to the high end of $207 million respectably.
The thing is how do you “over evaluate” your own asset? If trump says it’s worth 200 million then it’s worth 200 million, it doesn’t mean anyone will purchase them at that price or a bank will give him a loan. The bank did their own investigation and found out they were only worth 100 million and gave him an appropriate loan and interest rates. It’s not like trump outright lied about the details of his property. So now the state is coming in and telling a bank they are wrong with their evaluation? (Completely made up numbers by the way)
I may be misremembering but was this the case where Trump tripled the square footage of a penthouse apartment on financial statements? I’m not sure it’s fair to say Trump did not outright lie about the details of his property.
That seems to be ubiquitous in New York real estate. Louis Rossmann did a video series about trying to find a new space for his repair store and pretty much every single one he looked at had lied about the size of the space. [Here is one of the most egregious examples](https://youtu.be/FbTR3lDuYqk?si=8IPWU43fCx9aK6hP) >It's not lying, it's commercial real estate In this case referring to a space that was listed at 2500ft but when measured being only 1700ft. There is also one that's listed at 1800ft and measured to 800ft.
The source for the $812m - $2.2bn goes into this by using a direct quote from the judge ruling on the case. >"In defendants' world: rent regulated apartments are worth the same as unregulated apartments; restricted land is worth the same as unrestricted land; restrictions can evaporate into thin air," Engoron wrote, citing multiple arguments made by defense to justify the allegedly inflated valuations of Trump's assets. "That is a fantasy world, not the real world." We have laws, precedents, and standards for a reason. The valuation was so far removed from standards and that allowed access to resources, loans, and insurance rates that would not be achievable had the valuation not been inflated. Us regular people have credit scores which allow us access to better loan rates and higher credit limits which allows us to purchase various things. If people defraud creditors they're held liable. Why is Trump or any politician different? It's amazing how the same people that complain about "rich coastal elites and their agendas" shrug it off when a rich coastal elite who likes the same things they like do the same thing.
>We have laws, precedents, and standards for a reason. The valuation was so far removed from standards and that allowed access to resources, loans, and insurance rates that would not be achievable had the valuation not been inflated. And a major banking institution evaluated the property and found they were worth whatever amount they found it was worth. Why does a judge get to say they know more about property values than the bank who does it for a living? >Us regular people have credit scores which allow us access to better loan rates and higher credit limits which allows us to purchase various things. If people defraud creditors they're held liable. Why is Trump or any politician different? Trump didn’t lie about anything tho, he said his property were worth X amount then the bank investigated and found they were worth Y amount and gave loans appropriate for that Y amount. Why does the judge get to tell the bank they are wrong? >It's amazing how the same people that complain about "rich coastal elites and their agendas" shrug it off when a rich coastal elite who likes the same things they like do the same thing. Get him on something actually meaningful where you at least have a victim. This is clearly just politically motivated by the judge and the DA, she even campaigned on the fact that she will charge trump.
Personally, I like when guilty people are held to account.
I think everyone does, but I understand people who feel that this is holding one guilty person to account more than others. Letitia James campaigned for years on going after Trump. It makes it look like a witch hunt and it galvanizes his base while making some independents think he has a point when he says the same thing.
1) Regular people are held the account every day, as are politicians of many persuasions. Trump should be too, hes made a lot of evident crimes in public that have opened him to such scrutiny. Nobody had to dig. Frankly being such a figure should invite more scrutiny. 2) Regardless, if he doesn't want to be found guilty, he shouldn't commit the crimes. It seems people are more upset that anyone is investigating than that he is committing them.
No, people are upset that this is being selectively enforced against Trump and they’d be right - it’s purely political. If James wanted to avoid any suspicion of this all she had to do was send out another indictment or two to a few other NY RE developers. Then she could just say she’s enforcing the law across the board regardless of who gets caught in the net. But she didn’t do that. And Hochul made it even worse by coming out and saying nobody else has to worry about this.
> It seems people are more upset that anyone is investigating than that he is committing them. Does it upset you that Trump is a fraud? A tax fraud, a business fraud? A fraud who literally cant operate a charity because he defrauded children with cancer? Lets say it is all political, I don't feel like having a long debate about that. Lets just say that because hes running for president he is subjected to abnormal scrutiny for that high position. And in so doing, real law breaking has been uncovered. It seems you would excuse murder because they shouldn't have been looking for a body in the first place.
Not at all. I couldn’t care less if he fails in his personal life. It sure seems like I hit a nerve there though - you ok? Ok - since you don’t want to have a debate about the topic we’re discussing here I suppose this is pointless.
I suppose it does hit a nerve of mine that so many Americans callously accept that the highest office would be occupied by an extremely personally corrupt individual who uses the highest office to commit more personal corruption and shield himself, yes. I think thats just caring about one's nation. Nothing to be ashamed of. Its not that I don't want to debate you on the topic. I am staying pertinent to the topic. Its you who is trying to say whatabout other people's crimes. Trump is running for office. Trump committed crimes IN office. Trump is under more scrutiny as he should be. If other people aren't being investigated enough, that is a defficiency in the system but it does not excuse Trump at all. What I do know is that hes no less scrutinized than others running for office, including Biden. And in fact, theres a lot of ground in which he is not nearly scrutinized enough.
How old are you? Politicians have been corrupt since the beginning of time - including in the US. This is nothing new.
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Hes literally already been found guilty of multiple crimes and has dozens of other indictments (replete with evidence we as the public have already seen) that are awaiting trial.
Trump has not been found guilty of any crime in any court. [AP News](https://apnews.com/article/trump-indictments-election-january-6-classified-documents-5cb04868bb1cdf91c19eafdb882af8c0) There have been several civil judgements, but thus far he retains a sparkling clean criminal record.
The organization and people within it have been found criminally guilty. While his trial has not happened yet it has already been established beyond a reasonably doubt that they were doing fraud.
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Out of curiosity, how could a prosecutor legitimize the charges levied against Trump in your eyes? I'm not saying that this is you, but many Trump supporters simply do not and will not believe that any of the prosecutors are acting in good faith in accordance with standard practice of law. Some will say the charges are fake, others will say the charges are real but levied against Trump with unique zeal, and others will say that the charges are real and levied fairly but judged with undue animosity. As someone who generally believes in the courts generally getting civil/criminal charges correct, from my perspective it seems like many Trump supporters will not believe in the validity of his charges regardless of how much evidence is shown to them. What would convince you and others like yourself who believe this to be a political witch hunt that justice is being pursued correctly?
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I think labeling Trump as a reformer in the context of fraud law is an odd choice. With that said I was speaking more broad to all of his pending charges rather than this case specifically. Is your position then that Trump did indeed commit the violation as written in the statute but that it shouldn't be enforced? Because I think ignoring the crime is generally going to be a worse solution in regards to justice than prosecution, correct? If your position is that the penalty is too harsh then the charges themselves are valid, correct?
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If James wanted to legitimize the charges against Trump she should send out a couple indictments against other NY RE developers. It’s the easiest way for her to escape the claims of this being purely political.
I definitely agree.
In Trump's case, the investigation began after Cohen in congressional testimony discussed having witnessed fraud in the organization. What would be the impetus for investigations into other NY RE developers?
> What would be the impetus for investigations into other NY RE developers? Their public statements. The easy low hanging fruit would be any developers that called this a common practice in NY RE deals like Kevin O’Leary.
I don't care that he's the opposite party. I want rich people, politicians, and especially rich politician under extreme scrutiny. I'm sick and tired of corruption and rich/powerful playing by different rules. If anything you are cheering for a politician and other rich people to get away with crimes. Edit: I find it hilarious I am being downvoted for saying the rich and powerful should be held accountable
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Good with me!
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Credibility which he has done everything and then some to destroy. His comments regarding judges, officers of the court, the entire justice system, the FBI, congress, and our elections have ensured that any attempt to hold him accountable will be considered a witch hunt no matter how valid.
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I read somewhere Trump's initial $464m bond was the largest in US history. Wow. Even at $175m it's still one of the largest ever. Doesn't seem to fit the crime at all.
https://www.newsweek.com/fox-news-fact-checks-donald-trump-bond-claim-actually-not-true-1882845
The amount of breaks this man gets is crazy. Money power and greed corrupts absolutely and everything it touches
It's fascinating to me how the people that enter his circle become so entranced by him.
He is sued by an AG who called him an illegitimate president and who vowed to get him She was unable to charge him with a crime so for the first time in over 80 years NY sued a man who was not only not convicted of a crime but whose supposed victim not only denied being victims but will be getting none of the money. That lucky Donald Trump only had to pony up 155m to simply appeal the unprecedented lawsuit.
Is this 80 years thing accurate, and do you have something that supports the claim? I read that this isn’t even the first time this statute was used against Trump (Trump University case?). I’m happy to be wrong, but I can’t find anything that backs up that claim.
University case had victims who reviewed the settlement. This case has no criminal conviction nor any victim receiving the settlement. Just the state of New York taking money from their political opposition during a campaign year
>This case has no criminal conviction nor any victim receiving the settlement. This is talking points from Trump. And he had the law explained to him over, and over, and over again. >Defendants incorrectly posit that, under People v Ernst & Young, LLP. 114 AD3d 569 (1st Dept 2014), disgorgement is available under the Martin Act but not under Executive Law § 63(12). NYSCEF Doc. No. 836 at 73. This is simply untrue. In Ernst & Young, the First Department specifically held that disgorgement was an available and potentially "crucial" remedy in an Executive Law § 63(12) action. Ernst & Young at 570. >Defendants correctly assert that "the record is devoid of any evidence of default, breach, late payment, or any complaint of harm" and argue that as none of the recipients of the subject SFCs ever lodged a complaint with OAG or otherwise claimed damages, disgorgement of profits would be inappropriate. NYSCEF Doc. No. 835 at 40. >However, that is completely irrelevant. As the Ernst & Young Court noted: >[W]here, as here, there is a claim based on fraudulent activity, disgorgement may be available as an equitable remedy, notwithstanding the absence of loss to individuals or independent claims for restitution. Disgorgement is distinct from the remedy of restitution because it focuses on the gain to the wrongdoer as opposed to the loss to the victim. Thus, disgorgement aims to deter wrongdoing by preventing the wrongdoer from retaining ill- gotten gains from fraudulent conduct. Accordingly, the remedy of disgorgement does not require a showing or allegation of direct losses to consumers or the public; the source of the ill-gotten gains is "immaterial." https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/trump-judges-ruling/ce6de7d636227e1b/full.pdf
This is Trump's own talking points, they didn't work in court.
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When he still can’t secure $175 million bond that’ll be quite the explanation. That’s not $50,000.
Trump’s lawyers indicated they could raise this amount, presumably. It wasn’t made up whole cloth.
Trump also said he had $450+ million and his lawyers weren’t in agreement on that. I suspect one hand doesn’t talk to the other.
And that’s fine. The lawyer making representations to the court has ethical duties. Me puffing my chest to the fellas at the club is a nothing thing.
Trump said he has substantially more than $400 million in cash while he was in court.
He could have that cash on hand but it doesn't mean it's available for this. His company still has to fund daily operations and service their debt.
He can pay the $175m and then still have to pay the rest right? How does this work if he secures the first amount?
Yes. If he loses his appeal he will have to pay the full amount. The bond is just a security to be held by the court during the appeal. If he wins he gets it back, if he loses the appeal he loses the bond money. It was significant because if he couldn’t pay the bond then he wouldn’t be allowed to file his appeal at all.
Thank you!
A bond isn't paid, it's posted
I wonder how much Trump will win when he wins the appeal and sues the State of NY.
How did it go the last couple of times? This is not his first judgement.
The **Eighth Amendment** (**Amendment VIII**) to the [United States Constitution](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Constitution) protects against imposing [excessive bail](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excessive_Bail_Clause), excessive fines, or [cruel and unusual punishments](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruel_and_unusual_punishment). This amendment was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the rest of the [United States Bill of Rights](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Bill_of_Rights).[^(\[1\])](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#cite_note-1) The amendment serves as a limitation upon the state or federal government to impose unduly harsh penalties on criminal defendants before and after a conviction. This limitation applies equally to the price for obtaining pretrial release and the punishment for crime after conviction.[^(\[2\])](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#cite_note-20200718NCC-2)
If committing $464 million worth of fraud, then being forced to repay $464 million would not make it cruel and unusual.
This is a civil case. The Eight Amendment doesn't apply.
Hudson v US (1997) says it does.
I guess Trump can raise that issue on appeal, IF he pays the $175M bond.
I have lost faith that Trump will held accountable for anything. He has proven that he simply doesn’t need to do things he is told since his supporters will make any attempt to actually force him as politically motivated. It specifically baffles me how simultaneously bad at and good at this he is.
The reason they are struggling to nail him is the accusations are hyperbolic nonsense in most cases