Tag: Trump grift

Bush speechwriter reveals the key detail that is missing from Trump’s statements on company indictments

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Writing for The Atlantic on Thursday, David Frum, the former speechwriter to President George W. Bush, noted that Donald Trump doesn’t even appear to be trying to defend himself publicly or claim he is innocent.

Looking at speeches and statements pushed out by the former president, Frum noticed that all they do is attack other people, they never proclaim innocence. 

“An early indication that things may end badly for Trump is the statement released today from the Trump Organization,” he explained. Continue reading.

How Trump paying Cohen and Weisselberg’s legal fees could lead to extortion problems: reporter

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Legendary reporter and Trump foe Kurt Eichenwald noted that one of the biggest mistakes Donald Trump made with Michael Cohen could come back to bite him.

When Cohen was first indicted, he recalls the Trump family wrapping their arms around him. He was promised that all of his legal fees would be taken care of. “You are family,” he was told. But after a while, Cohen realized it would come down to him or Trump and he abandoned the president. That’s when Trump stopped paying his legal fees. 

As Eichenwald explained, if Trump does the same thing with Weisselberg, it could add an extortion charge to Trump. Continue reading.

Prosecutors allege a 15-year tax fraud scheme as the Trump Organization and CFO Allen Weisselberg are arraigned on multiple criminal charges

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NEW YORK — Prosecutors charged former president Donald Trump’s business with a 15-year “scheme to defraud” the government and charged its chief financial officer with grand larceny and tax fraud in a Manhattan courtroom Thursday, describing what they said was a wide-ranging effort to hide income from tax authorities.

In charging papers, prosecutors alleged that the Trump Organization effectively kept two sets of books. In one — for internal use — it carefully tallied the value of benefits given to executives as part of their compensation: apartments, cars, furniture, tuition payments, even money for holiday gifts.

But in the documents that the Trump Organization sent to tax authorities, prosecutors said, those benefits were omitted. Prosecutors said the result was that the Trump Organization and its executives avoided taxes on their full compensation: CFO Allen Weisselberg, they said, avoided paying more than $900,000. Continue reading.

Trump Organization Is Charged With Running 15-Year Employee Tax Scheme

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The company was accused of helping its executives evade taxes on compensation by hiding luxury perks and bonuses.

The Trump Organization, the real estate business that catapulted Donald J. Trump to tabloid fame, television riches and ultimately the White House, was charged Thursday with running a 15-year scheme to help its executives evade taxes by compensating them with fringe benefits that were hidden from the authorities.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office, which has been conducting the investigation alongside the New York attorney general, also accused a top executive, Allen H. Weisselberg, of avoiding taxes on $1.7 million in perks that should have been reported as income. Mr. Weisselberg, Mr. Trump’s long-serving and trusted chief financial officer, faced grand larceny, tax fraud and other charges.

“To put it bluntly, this was a sweeping and audacious illegal payments scheme,” Carey Dunne, general counsel for the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., said during an arraignment in State Supreme Court in Manhattan. Continue reading.

Trump exec Weisselberg pleads not guilty to fraud, conspiracy charges

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New York City prosecutors on Thursday charged the Trump Organization and its chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, with various fraud and conspiracy charges.

Weisselberg, who turned himself in earlier Thursday morning, pleaded not guilty to all 15 charges, which include tax fraud, conspiracy, grand larceny and falsifying business records. He and the Trump Organization have denied wrongdoing.

In an indictment that was unsealed Thursday afternoon, prosecutors alleged that Weisselberg helped orchestrate a scheme to compensate himself and “other Trump Organization executives” with unreported income. Continue reading.

The Memo: Trump faces legal and political peril

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Former President Trump’s attempts to remain politically powerful and position himself as a viable 2024 candidate could hit a big hurdle.

Prosecutors in New York look to be on the brink of leveling criminal charges against the Trump Organization, according to recent reports from The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Much remains unclear — and it is still technically possible that no charges will be brought, even though Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. (D) empaneled a new grand jury in May. But if charges are leveled, they will deal a heavy blow to the former president regardless of whether he is himself accused. Continue reading.

‘Trump was an unabated crime wave’: ex-prosecutor lists the atrocities

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Donald Trump has legal exposure for a “crime wave” committed while serving as president of the United State, a former federal prosecutor explained on MSNBC on Friday.

Glenn Kirschner told MSNBC anchor Ali Velshi “Donald Trump was an unabated crime wave as president.”

“Even before he became president he committed campaign finance violations with Michael Cohen, for which Michael Cohen went to prison,” he reminded. “Ali, then once he took office he could tick through the felony crimes that we can prove based on the information that has been publicly reported alone, whether it’s the bribery and extortion of President Zelenskiy, the ten counts of obstruction of justice meticulously documented by Bob Mueller in volume 2 of the Trump-Russia report for which Bob Mueller famously testified Donald Trump could be prosecuted upon leaving office.” Continue reading.

Biden administration keeps long-sought Trump hotel documents under wraps

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The Trump administration blocked Democrats’ efforts to unearth documents related to his leased D.C. hotel. Not much has changed under Biden.

For Donald Trump’s entire presidency, top congressional Democrats used every tool at their disposal to investigate the Washington hotel he leased from the federal government, issuing subpoenas, holding hearings and filing a lawsuit to try to bring the inner workings of Trump’s luxury property to light.

The efforts were framed as a defense of democracy itself. Rep. Peter A. DeFazio(D-Ore.) said the Trump administration’s refusal to provide documents “was not just disconcerting but an affront to the democratic institutions that the United States has been founded upon.” Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.) saidthe lawsuit, filed in federal court, was “in pursuit of justice to make sure our committee can fulfill its duty to the American people.”

None of it worked — a testament to Trump’s willingness to fight at every turn. But now, with the Biden administration in place, Democrats’ efforts to unearth and make public the information haven’t gone much better. Continue reading.

Trump’s Visit To New York For UFC Bout Cost Taxpayers Over $250K

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NEW YORK — Donald Trump’s spur-of-the-moment decision to travel to New York for a mixed martial arts fight in 2019 cost taxpayers more than $250,000, as the Secret Service had to scramble to provide security for the president on a particularly busy weekend in the city, according to federal records.

The records, which were obtained by the New York Daily News in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, reveal that the Secret Service was only given a one-week heads up on Trump’s one-night stay in Manhattan for an Ultimate Fighting Championship event at Madison Square Garden on Nov. 2, 2019.

The late notice appears to have caused a logistical headache for the Secret Service, which had to find hotel rooms for dozens of agents protecting Trump on the same weekend as the New York City Marathon. Continue reading.

Prosecutor in Trump criminal probe convenes grand jury to hear evidence, weigh potential charges

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NEW YORK — Manhattan’s district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict former president Donald Trump, other executives at his company or the business itself, should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges, according to two people familiar with the development.

The panel was convened recently and will sit three days a week for six months. It is likely to hear several matters — not just the Trump case ­— during its term, which is longer than a traditional New York state grand-jury assignment, these people said. Like others, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. Generally, special grand juries such as this are convened to participate in long-term matters rather than to hear evidence of crimes charged routinely.

The move indicates that District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr.’s investigation of the former president and his business has reached an advanced stage after more than two years. It suggests, too, that Vance thinks he has found evidence of a crime — if not by Trump, by someone potentially close to him or by his company. Continue reading.