Tag: The Trump Organization

Categories
Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump’s Worst Fear Is Coming True – He’s Running Out Of Money: Report

While criminal investigations into possibly illegal dealings at the Trump Organization continue and failed, one-term twice-impeached former President Donald Trump faces possible indictment, the finances of his company and his personal bank account are dwindling as he nears complete financial collapse.

Bloomberg recently summed up the financial problems facing Trump:

His financial disclosures and loan documents, interviews with former executives and industry analysts, and a host of legal fights and investigations reveal just how much trouble Trump and his company could face. Covid has been hard on office buildings key to his wealth and hotels and resorts that bear his name. The fallout from the Capitol assault has hurt his relationships with brokers and lenders. At least $590 million in loans come due in the next four years, more than half personally guaranteed by Trump, and his scrapyard of failed enterprises has only gotten more crowded.

Quite simply, Trump is running out of money and has almost no avenues left to make more because his name is so toxic that no one wants to be associated with him.

Legal problems and financial uncertainty are the two massive obstacles facing the ex-president, and the lack of money is probably of greater concern, according to CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, who said Friday:

“Donald Trump was the subject of a Friars Roast long before he was president. What he said to the people who were roasting him is, you can joke about anything except that I don’t have a lot of money. That’s the one thing you can’t joke about. But you know what? Donald Trump does not have a lot of money, and I think people are missing the point when they say the real risk to him is criminal prosecution, whether in the DA’s office or something out of Jan. 6.”

Trump has made his fortune in the hotel business, which is in a depression as a result of the pandemic, Toobin continued, adding:

“I don’t think there are going to be any criminal prosecutions, but because Deutsche Bank was so indulgent of his failed businesses for years and years, he has been able to stave off financial disaster. But Deutsche Bank said we’re done with him now, and he is not going to find American or big lenders in the United States or companies that do a lot of business in the United States, and that’s the real problem he faces in the next few years. It’s not just this hotel, it’s all the hotels that are doing terribly, and he doesn’t have the money to pay back his loans.”

Imagine it: Trump isn’t charged with any crimes, but he winds up financially busted. That would be exactly the karmic payback the “great businessman” most deserves.

Categories
Business Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump’s DC Hotel Is So Deserted That He’s Having Trouble Finding A Buyer: Report

Failed, one-term former President Donald Trump and his company, the Trump Organization, are desperately trying to sell their hotel in Washington, D.C., but business is so bad at the property that no one wants to make an offer to buy the hotel.

Jane Recker of Washingtonian recently dropped by the Trump hotel in the nation’s capital and reports it looked, sounded, and felt more like a tomb than a hotel:

It was 5 pm on the Tuesday after Labor Day, and roughly a dozen customers were in evidence—a tiny number for such a cavernous space. We camped out at the bar with a martini and a plate of fries, taking in the (lack of) scene. At one point, a maskless man approached us and asked, “Are you part of the Trump book club?” We were not. He wandered away, soon joining a small group across the room. A woman came to the bar and got a glass of Grenache. “I usually order the Trump wine,” she said, “but . . . .” She gazed around. “This is really a change from what it used to be. It used to be packed all the time.” She gulped her wine and left.

Another sign of just how little is going on at the Trump hotel: Recker spent two hours in the lobby and the elevator doors, she notes, didn’t move a single time.

At one point, it seemed things might change when a man approached Recker and sounded like he had some information for her:

Then again, maybe more is happening than is discernible to the naked eye. We struck up a conversation with a guy who was eager to chat with a journalist. “You ever write about Harris?” he asked, referring, we assumed, to the Vice President. He looked around suspiciously. “Meet me here at 10 o’ clock,” he said. “Get a few Irish whiskeys in me, I can tell you a lot of things.” We didn’t stick around.

The hotel has been on the market since 2019 and yet there have be no offers made to the Trump Organization. For all intents and purposes, it might just as well be what it once was before renovation: The old Post Office. At least when it served that purpose some people came in and gave the place some business.

Categories
Crime Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Prosecutor Who Investigated Trump University: Here’s The Proof That Donald Is Going To Jail

First things first. Let’s admit that when it comes to Donald Trump, those of us who loathe him are always chomping at the bits and impatiently waiting for the day he’s indicted and booked for the crimes he’s committed.

Now that we have that out of the way, the time has come to take a close look at the case that has already been filed against the Trump Organization and its CFO, Allen Weisselberg, who is facing decades behind bars if he doesn’t agree to cooperate with prosecutors and testify against his boss.

This leads us to an incredibly illuminating article from Andrea Bernstein of The New Yorker, who notes:

Even if no additional charges are filed, the former President’s company faces a potential reckoning. The charging documents and interviews with former prosecutors and white-collar defense lawyers indicate that the District Attorney is accumulating evidence of pervasive tax fraud. The case goes to the heart of what made—and still makes—Trump Trump.

Of course, as he so often does, Donald will likely toss Weisselberg under the bus and claim he had no idea that illegal activity was taking place at his company.

So is there any possible way to prove that Trump did indeed know Weissselberg was inflating the value of the Trump Organization in order to get loans from banks and then deflating the values when it came time to pay taxes?

One section of the indictment against Weisselberg and the Trump Organization shows that the former president won’t be able to claim ignorance of the crimes committed in his name:

People familiar with Trump’s legal battles also took notice of one element of the allegation: Weisselberg is described as making changes to something called “Donald J. Trump’s Detail General Ledger.” If true, the allegation would mean that, in addition to Weisselberg and Trump’s accountants keeping a set of records detailing the company’s finances, there was another ledger, one specifically maintained, the name implies, for Donald J. Trump. “My jaw literally dropped when I saw that,” Tristan Snell, a former New York assistant attorney general, who investigated claims of fraud against Trump University that resulted in a twenty-five-million-dollar settlement, said. “If there was a ledger for him, it blows up the notion that Trump didn’t know about it—it means there was a set of numbers prepared for Donald Trump.” Snell said the public disclosure of the separate ledger’s existence is a signal from the prosecutors to the former President: “We have your ledger.”

They have his ledger. And the ledger shows that crimes were committed and Donald Trump knew about them. He was fully aware of the massive levels of bank and tax fraud. He knew and he condoned it. It can even be said that he expected those who worked for him to do whatever was necessary to help him commit the fraud.

Donald Trump is going to prison. There’s no way to predict when, but it will happen. We’ll just have to tamp down our impatience and wait. But it certainly sounds like the wait will be worthwhile and richly rewarded.

 

Categories
Crime Eric Trump The Trump Organization

Eric Trump’s Attorney In Trump Org. Fraud Suit Just Dumped Him As A Client

An attorney representing Eric Trump in a fraud lawsuit brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James against the Trump Organization has abruptly resigned, according to Forbes, though it remains unclear why he did so.

Marc Mukasey of Mukasey Frenchman LLP informed a New York state Supreme Court judge in Manhattan that he was withdrawing from the case on Sept. 14. The move comes one day after a judge’s order to seal a stipulation between the parties was filed. Before that agreement, the docket shows no activity in this case since January. It’s not clear if there’s any connection between the agreement and Mukasey’s departure.

Mukasey declined to comment on the record for this story. He has represented Eric Trump in the case since it was filed in August 2020. Eric and representatives from the Trump Organization have not replied to inquiries.

Interestingly, Mukasey is a former law partner of Rudy Giuliani, who once represented former President Donald Trump until the ex-president stopped paying Giuliani for his services. The former New York City mayor is also under criminal investigation in several jurisdictions for his actions during the 2020 election, especially the numerous attempts made by Trump and his allies to overturn the results despite their failure to provide a scintilla of evidence that any fraud or irregularities took place in the balloting. Giuliani has also been barred from practicing law in the state of New York since July.

Mukasey has represented some controversial and high-profile clients over the years, including rogue Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher, oil-field service company Halliburton, and basketball coach Rick Pitino.

Attorney General James is investigating Trump Org. for allegedly falsifying the value of its assets to secure loans and reduce its tax liability.

Categories
Donald Trump The Trump Organization

Trump Is Close To Selling Washington D.C. Hotel But Will Likely Lose Big Money On The Deal: Report

Former President Donald Trump and his company, the Trump Organization, are reportedly close to making a deal for the sale of the Trump International Hotel in Washington D.C., but the asking price has gone down considerably since he left office and COVID-19 hit the travel and lodging industries like a wet blanket.

Axios reports that the original asking price for the hotel — housed in the historic Old Post Office building — was $500 million:

How it would work: Trump would sell the leasing rights to a real estate developer, who in turn would negotiate with hotel companies that would manage the property and rebrand it.

Representatives for Trump are said to be in talks with “major hotel chains and investors.”

Just how bad are things for the Trump Organization, which is built on hotels and resorts as the backbone of its business model? Consider these numbers:

“When Trump left office, The Washington Post reported that the D.C. hotel had a $170 million loan outstanding, and had seen revenue drop more than 60 percent compared to the previous year.”

So no matter what Trump gets for the property, he has to repay the $170 million loan or get the buyer to assume the debt, which seems unlikely with the hotel business in what can only be called a depression.

The Trump Organization is also facing massive loan payments to other financial institutions which could wind up bankrupting the company if they’re unable to meet their loan obligations.

Just last year, Forbes reported that Trump has nearly a trillion dollars of loans coming due:

“Lenders will expect his businesses to pay back an estimated $900 million in the next four years, an alarmingly accelerated timetable that involves more than twice as much debt as the president previously indicated. In order to emerge unscathed, Trump will likely have to engage in a series of high-stakes, big-money transactions—deals that could produce arguably the biggest conflicts of interest that an American president has ever had to face.

“About half of the debt coming due from the start of 2021 to the end of 2024 is secured against assets that the president and his children own outright. He will have to pay back loans against his hotel in Washington, D.C., his golf resort in Miami and his tower in Chicago. He’ll also have to sort out the debt against Trump Tower and Trump Plaza in New York City.”

What happens if the Donald is unable to repay those loans? The banks who loaned the money would begin to seize properties and other assets to satisfy the debt. That could destroy the Trump Organization and the man whose name it bears.