The Trump Organization has stalled a state inquiry into the financing of four properties for months, Attorney General Letitia James said in court papers.
By William K. Rashbaum and Danny Hakim, The New York Times
Aug. 24, 2020 Updated 3:15 p.m. ET
The New York State attorney general’s office has stepped up its inquiry into whether President Trump and the Trump Organization committed fraud by overstating assets to get bank loans, asking a judge to order Eric Trump to answer questions under oath and the company to hand over documents, court papers show.
Mr. Trump, who is President Trump’s son and an executive vice president of the company, abruptly canceled an interview with the attorney general’s office last month, and last week the Trump Organization told the office that the company and its lawyers would not comply with seven subpoenas related to the investigation.
The filings were made last week in State Supreme Court in Manhattan by the attorney general, Letitia James, and became public on Monday. They come as President Trump faces legal actions on other fronts. The Manhattan district attorney’s office has suggested in court filings that it is investigating possible bank and insurance fraud by the president and the Trump Organization.
The attorney general’s office started the civil inquiry in March 2019 after President Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael D. Cohen, told Congress that the president had inflated his assets in financial statements to banks when he was seeking loans and had understated them to reduce his real estate taxes.
The office initially subpoenaed records from two of the Trump Organization’s lenders, Deutsche Bank and Investors Bank, seeking loan records for four of the company’s big projects and a failed effort to buy the Buffalo Bills of the N.F.L. in 2014.
The Trump Organization at first provided some information and sought to forestall the attorney general from seeking a similar court order eight months ago, after the company failed to turn over information on a particular property.
But more recently, the attorney general’s office said, the Trump Organization had stalled and stonewalled, according to the filings, some of which were sealed.
By Sonia Moghe and Kara Scannell, CNN
Updated 1 hour ago Aug 24, 2020
(CNN) – The New York state attorney general is asking for a court to compel Eric Trump to be deposed in an investigation of the Trump Organization.
In court filings Monday, Letitia James’ office said Eric Trump initially agreed to sit for a deposition on July 22, only to refuse, “balking less than two days before he was scheduled by agreement to give testimony.”
James’ office outlined the scope of the investigation into whether the Trump Organization “improperly inflated the value of Mr. Trump’s assets on financial statements in order to secure loans and obtain economic and tax benefits.”
The attorney general’s office has been investigating President Donald Trump and the Trump Organization since 2019, when Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen testified before Congress that Trump’s annual financial statements inflated the values of his assets in order to secure favorable loans and insurance coverage, but deflated the value of other assets in order to reduce real estate taxes.
In the filing, James’ office states Eric Trump’s attorney sent a letter to the attorney general saying he would invoke “those rights afforded to every individual under the Constitution” as justification not to testify.
CNN has reached out to an attorney for Eric Trump for comment.
Alan Garten, chief legal officer for the Trump Organization, downplayed the development.
“There has been no lawsuit filed by the NY Attorney General,” Garten said. “This is simply a discovery dispute over documents and the like. As the motion papers clearly state, the NY AG has made no determination that anything was improper or that any action is forthcoming. We will respond to this motion as appropriate.”
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