Category: The Trump Organization

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Business Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump’s Financial Lies Just Got Him Booted From The World’s Most Exclusive Club

The same financial lies that have gotten disgraced, multiply-indicted ex-president Donald Trump in big trouble with the state of New York now have him in hot water with the most exclusive club in the world: The Forbes 400 ranking of America’s richest people.

Forbes announced today that as a result of Trump’s “relentless” lying to reporters for decades in a pathetic attempt to boost his ranking on the list, he has now been dumped from it completely.

His net worth is down more than $600 million from a year ago. The biggest reason: Truth Social, his social-media business. Trump once envisioned a significant percentage of the country logging onto the platform. But that never happened. Roughly 6.5 million have signed up so far, about 1% of the total on X (né Twitter). Trump’s 90% stake in Truth Social’s parent company has plummeted in value from an estimated $730 million to less than $100 million.

The failed former president is also failing badly on the real estate front, Forbes reports, with his Trump branded properties down in value by a staggering $170 million. That figure could be increasing by even more as the state of New York has also banned Trump and the Trump Organization from doing business in the state and are seeking at least $250 million in financial damages for the crimes allegedly committed by the company.

Is anything going well in the business world for Trump? Well, his golf clubs are at least making money.

As fewer people spend time in the office, more are goofing off on the golf course. That’s especially good news for Trump National Doral, the former president’s most valuable golf property, purchased for $150 million in 2012. Trump commenced an extensive renovation of the Miami resort, reportedly injecting more than $200 million of additional cash, before politics spoiled his investment.

The Donald has been off the list before, only to slither back onto it years later, Forbes notes.

In the 1990s, Trump took out enormous loans that resulted in well-publicized bankruptcies. He made a comeback from that but fell off once more in the midst of the Covid pandemic which hit the hotel and travel industry hard, leading to gigantic losses that he hoped would be offset by the launching of his Truth Social platform, which has been a total bust, with only 6.5 million users. That’s about 1% of the total who are on Twitter. Overall, Trump’s 90% stake in Truth Social’s parent company has fallen in value from $730 million to less than $100 million.

Can Trump reinvent himself this time and make a financial comeback? Considering that he’s 77 years old and facing decades in prison, it seems beyond impossible, especially for a man who doesn’t have an ounce of truth in his enormous, bloated body.

 

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Crime Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump Organization Facing Legal ‘Death Penalty’ From New York Attorney General

Now that she has concrete evidence that Donald Trump and the Trump Organization have been engaged in systematic financial fraud, New York Attorney General Letitia James may be on the verge of imposing the legal “death penalty” on the ex-president’s corporation, according to a former U.S. Attorney.

Joyce Vance, who served as U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama from 2009 to 2017, was a guest on MSNBC, and she was asked by host Chris Jansing about news that Trump’s former accounting firm, Mazars, has dropped him as a client and declared that his financial statements cannot be trusted:

“So Joyce, let me go to the Trump Organization statement, which is that, ‘this confirmation effectively rendered the investigation by the [Manhattan] DA and the AG. moot.’ Does it?”

Vance replied:

“It absolutely doesn’t, Chris, and one of the intriguing issues here is how did New York’s attorney general come into possession of this letter, which was sent from Trump’s accountant to the Trump Organization? She’s not cc’d on the letter; your accounting firm doesn’t typically send business correspondence to the attorney general in your state.”

Vance added:

“So there’s a suggestion here that Mazars is engaged with the New York attorney general. This whole issue came up as [NY AG] Letitia James was trying to take the depositions of Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr., and Ivanka Trump, and she’s been forced to justify that position by the Trump folks in the course of that litigation and this document has come out now.”

And then Vance explained how AG James can put a quick end to the Trump Organization:

“Details of other transactions that are highly questionable, and that may be sharp business practices or fraud, but James is likely to get her depositions, and she, of course, has jurisdiction under New York’s Martin Act to protect New York from sharp business practices. she has the authority to curtail businesses’ ability to operate, and even as she did with Trump’s charitable fund, to no longer permit them to operate in the state of New York. So the consequences here, just on the civil side, could be dramatic. The criminal investigation will proceed at its own pace.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7-NExoEcIg&feature=emb_logo

What is the Martin Act? It’s a piece of legislation passed in 1921 that is considered to be the “most severe blue sky law” in the country:

The Martin Act, as interpreted by New York courts, gives the New York State Attorney General exceptionally broad enforcement authority to bring both civil and criminal action without a showing of scienter or intent to defraud.

One of the penalties under the Martin Act is the complete shutdown of a business and forfeiture of its assets. That’s why it’s considered a legal “death penalty” if imposed.

Here’s hoping Letitia James does indeed shut down Trump Org. and then proceed to lock up every member of the company who was involved in this widespread fraud.

 

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Business Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump Tower Tenants Refusing To Pay Their Rent And Moving Out

Not so many years ago, Trump Tower was one of the most prestigious addresses in all of Manhattan. There was 100% occupancy and a waiting list to rent even the smallest spaces in the building.

But those days are gone, and Trump Tower is now at less than 75% occupancy, the lowest level since 2013, and a sign that times are indeed tight for the Trump Organization, which is facing a major loan payment later this year, the Washington Post reports:

“In its midsection, Trump Tower is something more prosaic: a Manhattan office building, with 12 floors available for lease. The Trump Organization’s headquarters occupies two other office floors.

“The leased floors serve as part of the collateral for one of Trump’s biggest outstanding debts, a $100 million loan with the full amount due next year, according to data kept by the real estate analysis firm Trepp.”

One of the former tenants that went belly up, ironically, was Marc Fisher Footwear, which used to manufacture shoes that carried the name of Ivanka Trump:

“But earlier this year, the Trump Organization sued Marc Fisher Footwear for unpaid rent. The suit said the shoemaker had stopped paying rent in November 2020, and owed more than $1.4 million.”

One tenant, however, is indeed paying their rent on time and at an exorbitant rate: The Make America Great Again PAC, which rents the 15th floor of Trump Tower, providing $37,541.67 a month in guaranteed revenue for Trump and his company, which some suggest may be legal but is certainly not kosher:

“He’s running a con,” said Paul S. Ryan, a campaign-finance expert at the watchdog group Common Cause. “Talking about political expenses — but, in reality, raising money for self-enrichment.”

Then again, Donald Trump has always run a con. In his days as a real estate mogul, he was doing little more than leveraging properties with borrowed money so he could pay off other loans he owed to other banks.

It’d be tempting to call Trump’s entire life a giant Ponzi scheme, but that’d be an insult to anyone who ever ran one of those.

 

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Crime Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Former Trump Org. CFO Fires His Attorneys And Appears Ready To Flip On The Donald: Report

Former Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg dumped his Trump-funded attorneys, according to reports from Newsweek and WNBC, the surest sign yet that he’s flipped on the failed former president and is ready to cooperate with prosecutors investigating alleged wrongdoing at the company.

The timing of Weisselberg parting ways with his Trump lawyers has resulted in suggestions he may have been about to, or already has, flipped on the former president, so the 75-year-old doesn’t end up spending more time in prison. Weisselberg already agreed to testify in The Trump Organization fraud trial in exchange for his potential jail sentence being reduced from 15 years to five months, but he didn’t implicate the former president.

Karen Agnifilo, former chief assistant district attorney of the Manhattan D.A.’s office, told MSNBC the move by Weisselberg is a significant development.

“It can mean one of two things. Number one, the case is over and doesn’t need lawyers anymore, they were just representing them on that one case,” Agnifilo said. “Or, more likely, is there was this pressure campaign put on him saying while he’s in Rikers, ‘do you like being there? Because we’re about to bring other charges.’

“If he testified in the grand jury, you wouldn’t necessarily know it because he’d be brought into the backdoor because he’s incarcerated,” Agnifilo added. “So unlike the other people Michael Cohen, or [attorney] Bob Costello, who told people that testified and we know about them because we see them going in and out of the building. You wouldn’t necessarily see Allen Weisselberg. So it’s possible he’s already testified, we just don’t know.”

The move by Weisselberg may also explain why a grand jury empaneled by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg hasn’t yet indicted Trump. Bragg could be planning to have the former Trump Org. CFO testify before the panel as a way of strengthening the case against the one-term ex-president.

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Crime Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump’s Attorneys Claim The Trump Organization Can’t Be Sued Because It Doesn’t Actually Exist

In a desperate, last-ditch effort to try and get around a $250 million fraud lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James, attorneys for failed former president Donald Trump asserted in a Thursday evening filing that the Trump Organization cannot be sued because it actually isn’t a legal entity.

Business Insider reports that the filing reads like a “nose-thumbing response” to the lawsuit from James.

“To the extent a response is required, Defendant specifically denies the definitions of “Trump Organization” and “Defendants,” reads Donald Trump’s response to the lawsuit, one of 16 answers filed late Thursday night.

“While the shorthand “Trump Organization” is utilized by Defendants for branding and business purposes, no entity as such exists for legal purposes,” Donald Trump’s response continues, using language that is repeated throughout his 300-page filing and throughout the similarly-lengthy 15 filings of his fellow defendants.

While the strategy is creative, it’s not likely to work because the lawsuit doesn’t seek to charge the Trump Organization.

New York’s lawsuit does not specifically sue anything called ‘Trump Organization.’ New York’s lawsuit names Donald Trump, Donald Trump, Jr., Ivanka Trump, Eric Trump, former company CFO Allen Weisselberg and its former payroll executive Jeffrey McConney. It also names 10 entities under the Trump Organization umbrella — including ‘The Trump Organization, Inc.,’ a registered corporation in New York since 1981.

The filing also contains repeated denials that the Trump Organization has done anything illegal, despite overwhelming evidence already provided by James that suggests otherwise and has already led to a judgement against the company.

Thursday night’s batch of responses briefly address these claims, repeating such blanket denials as “Defendant has not engaged in repeated fraudulent or illegal acts or otherwise demonstrated persistent fraud or illegality in the carrying on, conducting or transacting of business.”

James’ lawsuit would permanently ban the disgraced ex-president, Don Jr., Ivanka, and Eric Trump from ever doing business in New York, which is where the company is headquartered and a majority of Trump properties are located.

A trial in the matter is set for October in Manhattan.