A revelation by a court-appointed monitor in former President Donald Trump’s New York fraud case could play a role in deciding the fate of his businesses.
Barbara Jones, a former federal judge appointed by Judge Arthur Engoron to monitor the Trump Organization’s finances amid the proceedings, last week reported that the company “indicated that it has determined” that a $48 million loan Trump reported on his financial disclosures for multiple years “never existed.”
“If the loan never existed, that means that Trump — while under a court-appointed monitorship — was lying to the federal government and misleading the monitor,” MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin explained, adding that the “consequences could be significant.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who brought the lawsuit, is seeking $370 million in penalties against the Trump Organization and an order effectively barring Trump and his co-defendants from doing business in New York.
“In requesting said relief, the attorney general’s office argued that the defendants not only have ‘a demonstrated history of creating and using false financial documents,’ but also that their conduct is likely to recur without such measures,” Rubin wrote. “Why? Because, the AG’s office argues, Trump and the others’ unlawful financial conduct persisted throughout the attorney general’s investigation and even after the monitor’s appointment. That Jones has uncovered what could be even further evidence of fraud, as recently as last year, could be the cherry on top of the sundae that Engoron serves Trump.”
